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China Pilots a System That Rates Citizens on 'Social Credit Score' To Determine Eligibility For Jobs, Travel (technologyreview.com)

Speculations have turned out be true. The Chinese government is now testing systems that will be used to create digital records of citizens' social and financial behavior. In turn, these will be used to create a so-called social credit score, which will determine whether individuals have access to services, from travel and education to loans and insurance cover. Some citizens -- such as lawyers and journalists -- will be more closely monitored. From a report on MIT Technology Review: Planning documents apparently describe the system as being created to "allow the trustworthy to roam everywhere under heaven while making it hard for the discredited to take a single step." The Journal claims that the system will at first log "infractions such as fare cheating, jaywalking and violating family-planning rules" but will be expanded in the future -- potentially even to Internet activity. Some aspects of the system are already in testing, but there are some challenges to implementing such a far-reaching apparatus. It's difficult to centralize all that data, check it for accuracy, and process it, for example -- let alone feed it back into the system to control everyday life. And China has data from 1.4 billion people to handle.

23 of 204 comments (clear)

  1. Black Mirror by Yvan256 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    1. Re:Black Mirror by cayenne8 · · Score: 2
      Goodness.....

      PLEASE powers that be....make sure this is one thing we do NOT import from China to the US.

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    2. Re:Black Mirror by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Goodness.....

      PLEASE powers that be....make sure this is one thing we do NOT import from China to the US.

      I think the US already has it. It's called the No Fly List and they're trying to use it to take away some constitutional rights.

    3. Re:Black Mirror by swb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We will end up adopting this and already are at the margins, with car insurance rates often being tied to credit scores in addition to driving records.

      The power elite generally like what they see in China -- a system of enforced social standards, a system of laws backed by an authoritarian political system heavily influenced by money, and the ability to suppress dissent with the barrel of an AK-47. As long as the wealthy are able to influence the power elite and maintain economic status, what's not for them to like about China's system?

    4. Re:Black Mirror by cmiller173 · · Score: 2

      Also, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      "Whuffie, a form of digital social reputation, replaces money and is a constantly updated rating that measures how much esteem and respect other people have for a person. This rating system determines who gets the few scarce items, like the best housing, a table in a crowded restaurant, or a good place in a queue for a theme park attraction."

    5. Re:Black Mirror by sims+2 · · Score: 2

      What you mean like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... ?

      --
      Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
    6. Re:Black Mirror by cayenne8 · · Score: 2

      Using an airline or being allowed access in to a country that is not your country of origin/citizenship is not a constitutional right.

      Actually it is.

      Remember, the US Constitution does NOT grant rights, it is there to specify the limited rights, roles and responsibilities the US Federal govt is supposed to have.

      But your rights in the US are inherit to you just being born a human here. Pretty much everything is a right, unless restricted in some way by law, which most of is supposed to come at the state level.

      I say this as a partial answer to your response...with respect of the no-fly list parts that regulate flights of citizens within their own country (US).

      If there is to be a list that restricts a US citizen's free movement by any means about the US, or also used to restrict other rights, it cannot be a secret list and it MUST have a functional and easy way to contest being placed on that list as that mistakes can and will be made.

      Hell, remember not long back, Senator Ted Kennedy found himself on the no fly list....and I'm sure the average citizen couldn't get themselves off it as easily as he did and it took him a bit of time as I understand it.

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    7. Re: Black Mirror by pollarda · · Score: 2
      It is worth pointing out that senator Ted Kennedy was on the No Fly List. There is currently no reliable way to find out what you did to get on the list or get your name off the list. So while it makes total sense on an emotional level to use the No Fly List to screen people for all sorts of things, the fact of the matter is that it is inaccurate and there is no way to fix problems without spending a lot of money on attorneys. Also, even if there were an appeals process how long would that take? Do you think a public service employee getting minimal pay will review your case and get you off the list when their fear is that if they let someone off the list and then they commit a crime and make their judgement look bad.

      As to Ted Kennedy, he should have been on the Do Not Drive list for a host of reasons.

  2. F*cked twice by Errol+backfiring · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... and violating family-planning rules

    So, in effect, you're f*cked twice.

    --
    Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
  3. Bet authoritarians outside of china are cheering by Mashiki · · Score: 2, Insightful

    After all, this is the perfect wrong-think system. Refuse to engage in political correctness or say something like "there are only 2 genders" or "free speech is an inalienable right" and you can have other things granted by the state taken away. Considering the triggered snowflakes going around these days, I'm sure they'd love it as well. Anyone want to take bets on the first western university to follow up and try implementing a system like it? A coercing version of no-platforming to boot perhaps?

    --
    Om, nomnomnom...
  4. More prophetic than ever... by Noryungi · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it, moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live -- did live, from habit that became instinct -- in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.

    We are getting there. Thanks for the warning, George. Too bad nobody listened.

    Coming soon to a country near you.

    --
    The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
  5. Calculated values can always be hacked. by jellomizer · · Score: 2

    I am sure for all of you who work in an organization with some sort of performance monitoring method can tell. It is rather easy to hack the system. Where people are paying more attention to beating the numbers then actually trying to achieve the goals these metrics are meant to measure.
    Lines of code: short lines, with blank comments and a lot of extra line breaks.
    Time to close ticket: Get a ticket do the most basic fix and close it without verification.
    Time to respond to a call. Pick up the phone then hang up.

    Metrics can be hacked so people are working on the metrics. Causing the system to break down.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  6. Re:Not being listened to, but rather shouting by clifwlkr · · Score: 2

    And oddly people continue to shout, rather than being listened to in a hidden manner.

    This is why I do not participate in things like Facebook. This is a wealth of information about what you do that is freely out there for the government to use for this kind of activity. They don't even have to have a listening device in your house, people voluntarily put all of this up there for them to parse and monitor on a daily basis. This is what the government (and never mind your future employer) will use to make the determination about where your loyalties lie.

    Of course then what does posting nothing on these sites say about you as well then? :-)

  7. Big government helping the people by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is nothing but big government doing what it does best - helping its people. Instead of allowing the people to make their own decisions, it is making the correct decisions for them. And why not? The smartest people run the Chinese government. You can't be any geek off the street and join the Communist Party. You have to be smart and capable, and only the cream rises to the top. Why shouldn't these people be able to run society? I see people on Slashdot all the time bemoaning how stupid people ruin everything. See: Donald Trump voters. Things would be SO much better if we smart people just had to power to change things.

    Isn't eliminating negative outcomes and ensuring positive outcomes one of the major arguments in favor of big government? This is what China is doing. Oh, it eliminates personal freedom? The personal freedom that Chinese people never had at any point in history? You mean "freedumb". Because people who bitch and moan about freedom all the time are precisely the ones who make such consistently wrong decisions. Why shouldn't the government step in and help them? Isn't that why we established governments in the first place?

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    Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
    1. Re:Big government helping the people by Kjella · · Score: 2

      The key element that you're missing is that you need smart people acting in the best interests of the whole people. Any time we've granted any elite power they've inevitably used it for personal gain or the elite's interest instead of the public good, it doesn't matter what they're capable of providing a better government if they're not willing. That's why we're weary of people seeking power, they usually want it for all the wrong reasons. And even those who try with the best of intentions find that to rise in the system you must work the system. And then you get caught in the same web of lies and deceptions, friends and foes, favors and kickbacks as every other politician.

      That's why people say "democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others", because it's the only one where everyone's interests get represented even if their capability in recognizing those interests and selecting those most capable to act on it is lacking to say the least. That is really the unlikely side of the utopia we're clamoring for, some of the people we have in office are clearly skilled manipulators if nothing else but extremely few seem to rise above the party lines and really act in everyone's best interests. In that sense I guess (R) and (D) and (CPC) are pretty much all alike.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  8. Re: Can't afford China...or anything by stealth_finger · · Score: 2

    It's bad enough I can't afford anything, now I'm a chatbot? Fuck you!!!!

    You could make some money passing the Turing test for other chatbots?

    --
    Wanna buy a shirt?
    https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
  9. Only in China? Nah. by argStyopa · · Score: 3, Informative

    In a US where there is a broadly sweeping and growing generational consensus that government should:
    - provide all healthcare
    - protect everyone from any conceivable harm whether practical, realistic or not (from terrorists to pedophiles), - even from their OWN CHOICES - and at literally any expense ...you're fooling yourself.

    "Any government powerful enough to give the people all that they want is also powerful enough to take from the people all that they have."

    Famously NOT said by T.Jefferson, but pretty damned good comment nonetheless.

    --
    -Styopa
  10. The Unknown Citizen by geek · · Score: 2

    (To JS/07 M 378
    This Marble Monument
    Is Erected by the State)
    He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
    One against whom there was no official complaint,
    And all the reports on his conduct agree
    That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a
          saint,
    For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
    Except for the War till the day he retired
    He worked in a factory and never got fired,
    But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
    Yet he wasn’t a scab or odd in his views,
    For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
    (Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
    And our Social Psychology workers found
    That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
    The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
    And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
    Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
    And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
    Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
    He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan
    And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
    A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
    Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
    That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
    When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.
    He was married and added five children to the population,
    Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his
          generation.
    And our teachers report that he never interfered with their
          education.
    Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
    Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

  11. Re:Time for the Chinese citizens to start shooting by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

    Do you honestly think armed Chinese citizens could stand up to their government? For that matter, do you think Americans could stand up to theirs?

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  12. Old news. by The+Raven · · Score: 4, Informative

    New to /. maybe, but this was revealed over a year ago. Extra Credits did a pretty good video covering the dystopian system from a game developer point of view.

    --
    "I will trust Google to 'do no evil' until the founders no longer run it." Hello Alphabet.
  13. Re:Time for the Chinese citizens to start shooting by Grishnakh · · Score: 3, Insightful

    In fact, there have been more gun control laws passed these past three years than in the entire history of the nation combined. Are we safer? Definitely not.

    Oh please, this is just plain dumb. Obviously, you must be extremely young, because guns are easier to get and much more ubiquitous than they have been in a long time, and the laws are much more relaxed. Go back to the 70s: legal concealed carry didn't exist back then, and states that are now open-carry were not. It's easier and cheaper than ever to get an AR-15 rifle and all the accessories you could possibly want for it. Now they're even trying to legalize suppressors. The variety of guns you can get now is overwhelming too; back then it was mainly just crappy revolvers; now there's an endless array of guns of all types, many specifically designed for concealed-carry.

  14. Re:The Chinese Mind by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm a Chinese immigrant and read Chinese news everyday. No where did I find this story mentioned, neither from main land news sites nor overseas ones. Maybe it's a secretive thing, I don't know. But I tend to think it's a money grab kind of project like many others that's not really practical or intended to be. You seem like a person with an open mind, so I'll say this. Take everything you read about China from the western media (including this site) with a grain of salt. It's very very biased. Think about how the media acted during the election. It's on that level and beyond. I'll probably be labelled a "50-cent" in no time, but anyways.

  15. Re:Humans by djinn6 · · Score: 2

    Just curious, how did you manage to get internet in Somalia?