Title: How China Is Watching Its Citizens in a Modern Surveillance State
Headings: China is building a vast civilian surveillance network — here are 10 ways it could be feeding its creepy 'social credit system'
China is building a vast civilian surveillance network — here are 10 ways it could be feeding its creepy 'social credit system'
China is building a powerful digital surveillance state.
1. Using facial recognition technology that can pick people out of massive crowds.
A crowded railway station in Guangzhou, southern China.
A BBC reporter who tested a facial recognition system in Guiyang, southwest China, found that it only took seven minutes for authorities to catch him. Watch how:
2. Getting group chat admins to spy on people.
3. Forcing citizens to download apps that allow the government to monitor their cell phone photos and videos.
The screengrab on the left shows Jingwang prompting users to delete "dangerous content" on their phone, while the one on the right shows the app's access.
4. Watching how people shop online.
Jack Ma's Alibaba uses a lot of big data to evaluate its customers.
5. Having law enforcement officers wear special glasses to identify people in crowded places, like streets and train stations.
An actor wears facial recognition eyewear in a promotional video by LLVision Technology, the Chinese tech company that developed the glasses.
6. Installing 'robot police' in train stations that scan people's faces and match those of wanted fugitives — like this one in Zhengzhou, central China.
This robot police can reportedly clean, monitor the air quality, and locate fires in the vicinity as well.
7. Using facial recognition technology to root out jaywalkers.
8. Stopping pedestrians at random to check their phones.
A police officer checks the identity card of a man in Kashgar, Xinjiang, in March 2017.
9. Tracking people's social media posts, which can be linked to the user's family and location.
An internet cafe in Taiyuan, northeastern China.
10. Building predictive software to aggregate data about people — without their knowledge — and flag those they consider threatening.
Security cameras in Tiananmen Square, Beijing.
Facial technology and digital data collection is used much more liberally in China than elsewhere in the world. The EU, by comparison, is rolling out new data privacy regulation that would restrict the amount of personal, biometric, and social media data that companies can collect.
Mark Zuckerberg jogging through Tiananmen Square, Beijing.
People in the country are split over how they feel about this modern surveillance state. While some have pointed out the violation of consumers' and citizens' rights, others say they feel safe because of the government's "Big Brother"-esque surveillance.
A police officer watches over a street in Kashgar, Xinjiang, while ethnic Uighur children play.
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SEE ALSO: China has started ranking citizens with a creepy 'social credit' system — here's what you can do wrong, and the embarrassing, demeaning ways they can punish you
SEE ALSO: These are the things that can get you punished under China's creepy 'social credit' system — from fake news to jaywalking

Content: Getting group chat admins to spy on people. REUTERS/Danny Moloshok
China holds people criminally liable for content posted in any group chat they initiate on messaging apps. The regulation applies even to private and encrypted apps, such as WhatsApp. The government also requires tech companies to monitor and keep records of conversations for six months, and report any illegal activity to authorities. 3. Forcing citizens to download apps that allow the government to monitor their cell phone photos and videos. The screengrab on the left shows Jingwang prompting users to delete "dangerous content" on their phone, while the one on the right shows the app's access. Jingwang Weishi/Open Technology Fund
The government has forced Uighurs, an ethnic minority in western China, to download an app that scans photos, videos, audio files, ebooks, and other documents, the US-government funded Open Technology Fund said. The app, named 浄网 (pronounced "jingwang" in Mandarin Chinese, and literally means "cleansing the web"), extracts information including the phone number and model, and scours through its files, the Open Technology Fund reported. It also warns users to delete files it deems dangerous and sends information about those files to an outside server.