China's All-Seeing Eye
With the help of U.S. defense contractors, China is building the
prototype for a high-tech police state. It is ready for ex****t.
Naomi Klein
Rolling Stone Magazine, Issue 1053 — May 29, 2008
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/20797485/chinas_allseeing_eye/print
EXCERPT
....China-ba****ng never fails to soothe the Western conscience — here is
a large and powerful country that, when it comes to human rights and
democracy, is so much worse than Bush's America.
But during my time in Shenzhen, China's youngest and most modern city, I
often have the feeling that I am witnessing not some rogue police state
but a global middle ground, the place where more and more countries are
converging.
China is becoming more like us in very visible ways (Starbucks, Hooters,
cellphones that are cooler than ours), and we are becoming more like
China in less visible ones (torture, warrantless wiretapping, indefinite
detention, though not nearly on the Chinese scale).
What is most disconcerting about China's surveillance state is how
familiar it all feels. When I check into the Sheraton in Shenzhen, for
instance, it looks like any other high-end hotel chain — only the lobby
is a little more modern and the cheerful clerk doesn't just check my
pass****t but takes a scan of it.
"Are you making a copy?" I ask.
"No, no," he responds helpfully. "We're just sending a copy to the
police."
Up in my room, the Website that pops up on my laptop looks like every
other Net ****tal at a hotel — only it won't let me access human-rights
and labor Websites that I know are working fine.
The TV gets CNN International — only with strange edits and obviously
censored blackouts. My cellphone picks up a strong signal for the China
Mobile network.
A few months earlier, in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of China Mobile
bragged to a crowd of communications executives that "we not only know
who you are, we also know where you are." Asked about customer privacy,
he replied that his company only gives "this kind of data to government
authorities" — pretty much the same answer I got from the clerk at the
front desk.
When I leave China, I feel a powerful relief: I have escaped. I am home
safe. But the feeling starts to fade as soon as I get to the customs
line at JFK, watching hundreds of visitors line up to have their
pictures taken and fingers scanned.
In the terminal, someone hands me a brochure for "Fly Clear." All I need
to do is have my fingerprints and irises scanned, and I can get a Clear
card with a biometric chip that will let me sail through security.
Later, I look it up: The company providing the technology is L-1.
== What is L-1 ?
Yao is managing director of Pixel Solutions, a Chinese company that
specializes in producing the new high-tech national ID cards, as well as
selling facial-recognition software to businesses and government
agencies. The test, the first phase of which is only weeks away, is
being staged by the Ministry of Public Security in Beijing. The idea is
to measure the effectiveness of face-recognition software in identifying
police suspects. Participants will be given a series of photos, taken in
a variety of situations. Their task will be to match the images to other
photos of the same people in the government's massive database.
Several biometrics companies, including Yao's, have been invited to
compete. "We have to be able to match a face in a 10 million database in
one second," Yao tells me. "We are preparing for that now."
The companies that score well will be first in line for lucrative
government contracts to integrate face-recognition software into Golden
****eld, using it to check for ID fraud and to discover the identities of
suspects caught on surveillance cameras. Yao says the technology is
almost there: "It will happen next year."
When I meet Yao at his cor****ate headquarters, he is feeling confident
about how his company will perform in the test. His secret weapon is
that he will be using facial-recognition software purchased from L-1
Identity Solutions, a major U.S. defense contractor that produces
pass****ts and biometric security systems for the U.S. government.
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