China's Surveillance State Will Soon Track Cars (wsj.com)

China is establishing an electronic identification system to track cars nationwide, according to a report on WSJ, which cites records and people briefed on the matter. From a report: Under the plan being rolled out July 1, a radio-frequency identification chip for vehicle tracking will be installed on cars when they are registered. Compliance will be voluntary this year but will be made mandatory for new vehicles at the start of 2019, the people said. Authorities have described the plan as a means to improve public security and to help ease worsening traffic congestion, documents show, a major concern in many Chinese cities partly because clogged roads contribute to air pollution. But such a system, implemented in the world's biggest automotive market, with sales of nearly 30 million vehicles a year, will also vastly expand China's surveillance network, experts say. That network already includes widespread use of security cameras, facial recognition technology and internet monitoring.

Comments

This is no different

[nehumanuscrede]

than the GPS enabled " digital " license plate California wants to roll out other than the different spin put on it.

China does it = Evil Surveillance State
California does it = No way we'll ever use it for nefarious purposes ! We pinky swear ! We're the good guys ! :|

Rich

[Excelcia]

This is rich. China's surveillance state. How about the UK with ANPR - not just the UK, there are a lot of placed, even here in Canada, with ANPR now but not like the UK has. How about the NSA tapping into every internet backbone in the world? The Five Eyes have more domestic surveillance than China will ever have.

Stories like this make me angry. Not because I think of China as being any better, but because people who write these kind of headlines are just so willfully ignorant it makes my teeth itch. We (read every resident of a Western democracy) have been living in the kind of a surveillance state for the last decade as would have given the head of the KGB at the height of the Soviet Union an absolute erection.

Re:20 years behind the US...

[ShanghaiBill]

US has EZ-Pass, which is a defacto tracking system, even if not originally designed as such.

EZ-Pass / FasTrak are opt-in, so not the same at all.

They can be legally removed from the vehicle at anytime.

Good a reason as any to do away with toll roads

[rsilvergun]

for the same reason I want Medicare for All I'd like to see toll roads go away. Some things should just be paid for by civilization as a whole. China isn't oppressing these people for shits and giggles. They're doing it because they've got massive wealth inequality and this is how you maintain a society when you've got lots of folks who lack food security and shelter. The reason you guarantee a decent quality of life is because you can't be free when somebody controls your access to food, shelter, healthcare, education & transportation. The latter being needed to access to former. Until then you're a weeks meals or a harsh winter away from doing whatever the folks in charge of the money say.