China wants to dominate internet

For the past year, the US and China have been engaged in a wide-ranging trade war. Nominally, the dispute concerns intellectual-property violations, forced technology transfers and other unfair practices. In reality, though, this clash is a symptom of a much larger strategic showdown — one in which Chinese President Xi Jinping seeks “decisive victory.”
Aided by technology, China is embarking on a new kind of geopolitical strategy. As the Chinese Academy of Sciences explained, the goal is to build a “ubiquitous and universally used information network system.” In doing so, China hopes to bolster its national champions, increase the world’s reliance on Chinese technology and erode US strategic advantages. It also wants to gain control over global data
and information exchanges, thereby claiming leverage to advance its interests. America and its allies must recognise this threat and prepare to respond forcefully.
Beijing deploys protectionist policies in areas of the economy thought to be strategically valuable.
The oft-cited “Made in China 2025” initiative stresses the need to foster Chinese companies in high-tech fields such as robotics, aerospace and information technology in the hopes of competing with Western tech giants. The subsidies and protectionist measures that support the plan are a major point of contention with the US.
But China’s true ambitions are larger. In the longer term, it seeks an all-encompassing advantage in what it perceives to be a zero-sum race for technological dominance. Its strategy to achieve this goal is twofold.
First, China is importing ideas and innovation from overseas. Sometimes that means overtly siphoning technology and trade secrets. Sometimes it’s more subtle. Second, China is using the technologies it exports to collect data from abroad. Alipay, Alibaba’s mobile-payments business, is swooping up vast amounts of transaction data as it expands globally. Chinese surveillance systems are ubiquitous in Africa, while businesses and hobbyists around the world fly DJI drones — even though they may be sending sensitive information back home. Soon, your phone might connect to a Chinese 5G network, while your mapping or fitness apps might be sending their data to Beijing.
Collecting data, though, is just the start. China wants to lace all these systems together in what Xi calls the “network great power strategy.” The idea is to make Chinese technology a foundation for the global flow of information and transactions — and thus to expand the Chinese Communist Party’s leverage, influence and power worldwide.
The US and its allies need a more comprehensive
response. Coordination among US allies and partners won’t be easy. But cooperating to constrain China’s ambitions, and to protect free competition and open networks, has never been more essential.

—Bloomberg