I have this exact model. I can confirm that the censorship list is not active. I have tried to send SMS messages with censored words and there was no problem.
Recently I had a problem that the phone nagged me about "activating" the 2nd SIM card at boot if the "Find my device" Xiaomi functionality was enabled. It seems to be a part of the tracking functionality if my phone gets lost. The "activation" of the SIM card failed every time, but it sent a SMS to a UK number and billed me about 0,17€ for it. I only figured it out when I saw my phone bill.
I had an earlier Xiaomi phone and I recorded all my phone calls on it. The creepy thing is that I didn't know that Xiaomi was sycing all my files with Xiaomi Cloud.
Your test means nothing. The problem here is the potent risk, not the current state of the filter.
Exactly the same scenario as with the Huawei 5G products. It is a major risk building your entire "smart" infrastructure with a line of products that could at some unspecified future date start clamping down on you via remote software updates, just because you insulted the dear leader or did something else to anger the regime.
Did we not see this already with H&M stores in China? I can't believe there are still (smart) people here on HN who pretend like there's no danger involved.
I recall the times when this was being discussed and from an European perspective it seemed curious that the US tech crowd was so eager to ban Huawei products — especially after there being multiple cases of back-/bugdoors in the gear of american vendors, while at that point there was none with Huawei gear that we knew of.
I don't trust chinese gear. But I also don't trust the gear built in a nation where the patriot act is active.
The answer is to use a propper vendor mix and to think carefully what is used where.
Well, you've stumbled on the real reason for panic and dubious stories about Chinese spying -- the actual problem is it presents a possible hindrance to our own spying because the Chinese won't play ball.
The discussion about "strategic autonomy", "digital sovereignty", whatever you might call it, is led fundamentally different in various countries. Here in Europe (on the EU level), the discussion is led on how Europe is caught between the US and China, both sides trying to exploit our data. [1] Here in Germany, the discourse is usually more focused on our state trying to exploit our data and disturb our privacy, or on american companies. In the french discussion some people go so far as to call the US dominance in software a kind of "digital colonization". [2] Of course there is danger in China's products, and there are a lot of serious efforts to minimize the risks, but the US hasn't really been any help, it is just the pot calling the kettle.
> Did we not see this already with H&M stores in China? I can't believe there are still (smart) people here on HN who pretend like there's no danger involved.
That comparison doesn't really hit the mark: A consumer-led boycott within China, dubious as the reasons may be, is in no way an attack on our sovereignty. Apart from pretty wack but minor diplomatic incidents, there hasn't really been much actual damage done by China towards the EU. I agree with you that 5G infrastructure should probably fall in large parts under any strategic autonomy policy, but buying Xiaomi phones seems pretty inconsequential.
H&M was not a "consumer-led boycott" - it was an effort by the owners of the digital infrastructure (major ecommerce platforms in this case) to actively hide the existence of H&M stores in China.
The US vs China argument is detrimental in any case. The discussion should evolve into achieving digital sovereignity as a whole, not argue about whether player x or y in the current rotten system is better.
This will most certainly not be solved on an EU level. The only outcome that they could produce would be replacing US & China with EU-controlled narrative and again, it's just repeating the same problem, albeit in lesser severity.
Who cares if the list is there or not. They can always just beam an update to the phone, if the argument is that I should be scared of something they theoretically might do at some time in the future.
Xiaomi brings money into China. China isn't dumb enough to slay a golden goose. H&M retail stores take money out of China. The CCP would wait for any excuse to start a nationalist boycott. It's like a free, one-sided trade war. They're still happy to let their factories sell to H&M though.
> the censorship list is not active. I have tried to send SMS messages with censored words and there was no problem
your testing is not thorough, there are many other things the "censorship list" could be used for, including not censoring at all, rather "forward this user's internet searches to china", and the things it does could be turned on and off based on other parameters
what is even more creepy is that you record all your phone calls. i dont know where you are, but here in Germany this is very severe breaking of the law that is punishable according to the StGB.
Really hope at least HMD/Nokia keeps Android One alive, did they push everyone else out of that market or what? Are phones with bundled crap that much cheaper for comparable specs?
There are very few choices for a cheapish phone that gets security updates and isn't drowning in crapware and "telemetry". It looks like Nokia is the last brand releasing Android One mobiles: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_One#2021
Currently I am using a Nokia 3.4 and it has been great value IMHO.
I realize this doesn't fit the narrative in here. But Xiaomi actually allows you to remove any app without root via USB. You kinda have full control about your apps at least, something that is already luxury these days
I honestly can't be the only person who doesn't care about a non-active filter list that was probably left over by some dev who put it in there for Chinese users.
I feel like at this point we're just scraping the bottom of the barrel for the daily dose of anti-Chinese content
Did you miss the part where it could be activated remotely, and was modified remotely in an attempt to conceal its nature as a political tool? As we've seen with the US, governments will do anything they think they can get away with. Making it known that even the tiniest millimetric step in this direction with not be tolerated is extremely important as the West's tech landscape is occupied more and more by Chinese devices, Chinese software, and Chinese algorithms.
Updating any smart phone to the same functionality over the air would be trivial though.
So if you were the Chinese government wanting to stop those phrases being used at some time in the future, it would make more sense to send the list at the time you activate the list, rather than in advance to be found before it's ever been activated.
It's tempting to assume incompetence but I'll go with the following: they might be testing the waters and check if the Western society is vigilant and reacting to their actions.
Hundreds of generic "naughty" words were added to the list remotely by Xiaomi in order to make the list seem like it wasn't intended as a political tool, then Xiaomi remotely deleted it from the phone.
Nope because I'm not arrogant enough to think that the Chinese people are oppressed just because they don't live by your values. I have actually lived in China, and regardless of wherever anyone stood on politics, they were unified by one thing, they had no interest in being governed by foreign rule ever again.
Exactly this. This idealistic discussion is leading nowhere, still, my 2 cents. I experienced this opinion when speaking to people who never lived there or even spoke with people from there.
In fact people there are fully aware of the censorship and either ignore it, find easy ways around it or even mock it and make fun of it: from creating the globally famous "Winnie the Pooh" synonym to memes that are shared.
Given that "free speech" is nonexistent even in the West (or in the case of the US: quickly dying because of new Puritanism), many would answer that question differently.
If they’re a commie (atheist) they don’t believe in an afterlife anyway, so there isn’t really any accountability in the mind of such a person if they can get away with whatever they do in this life.
I am a capitalist-as-it-gets atheist. How dare you equate me to a communist! Belief in gods has nothing to do with belief in politicians' ability to manage the economy.
> If they’re a commie (atheist) they don’t believe in an afterlife anyway, so there isn’t really any accountability in the mind of such a person if they can get away with whatever they do in this life.
Unlike the religious people who believe, that they can sin as much as they want to, just as long as they repent, and then still go to heaven?
Don’t take the ”highest GDP” statement at face value. It’s not only a lie (the US still has the highest GDP), GDP also doesn’t account for economic imbalances. Much of the Chinese population are living in poverty.
Chinese shills will claim that poverty has been eliminated, but that’s only true if you lower the poverty line. You could set the poverty line to 10 USD/year if you wanted to and by doing so “solve poverty”.
There is much room for misinformation and lies when it comes to these issues. One has to stay vigilant.
China just hasn’t yet gotten the chance to commit as many atrocities abroad yet, which is something that it’s currently threatening to do. South China Sea, Taiwan, the occupation of Hong Kong, Silk road initiative, Predatory lending to African despots, Chinese naval base in Africa, China eating away at the Indian border, and the list goes on.
The only one of these that is credible in my opinion is the Indian border issue which I have little understanding of. My understanding of the B&R initiative is that while there are terms that are not always good for the debtor, they are far superior to IMF/World Bank loans that destroy the target nation's economic foundation by requiring privatization and reduction of labor protections. I don't know exactly what you mean by despots.
Taiwan is debatable, but I see it as a regional dispute over an artifact of the civil war. Honk Kong I am suspicious of as the protests seem to be supported by the CIA and are pro-capitalist. The B&R initiative, building economic infrastructure to support the region, is a good thing, I don't see how that's an issue.
My phone is not secure. It is not the device I trust. I don't trust Google, I don't trust the US to somehow collect data and I don't trust the Chinese neither.
Thing is no websites or banks trust ME if I don't have a kinda recent mobile phone with Googeld Android or OSX.
This is the kind of stupid, racist mindset that has allowed the majority of world governments to be corrupt and abusive. All monopolies need extreme measures to not suck as much, and the Chinese gov being shitty to their citizens will lower your own leverage against your government. (It’s not like the authoritarian trend is not already visibly global.)
Please read my comment in context to what I was responding to. The person who I was responding to said essentially "If a government doesn't follow my values it should be dissolved."
>You should be more open minded that different people and cultures have different values.
So I can start owning slaves, if I claim it fits my values? Or I need to gather some minimal number of fellow slave owners, so I can declare it 'culture'?
That is a more extreme example so by it will make what I say sound more extreme.
>So I can start owning slaves, if I claim it fits my values?
Keep in mind that owning a slave is illegal in many places. Laws are also shaped by culture. So if you moved somewhere were slaves were legal then yes you could.
It's a human idea and a human invention, developed in a certain historical context. Calling it "made up" is pejorative, for sure, but not at all wrong.
It isn't like the Hubble Deep Field has a pattern that spells out "all human beings are born free and equal" or something.
I agree with GP that human rights are made up but would love to hear why and how you think they aren't. That would be a far better read than this pointless post that doesn't contribute anything to discussion.
If you asked me what human rights I have I couldn't tell you. Do I pick stuff from the bill of rights, do I pick stuff from my religion? How do I know what rights I have?
American power lead to a reduction in wars believe it or not. There would have been a lot more death and destruction, even with the mistakes America has made, than had there been this current inward looking naval gazing America. When Chinese power controls the world you’ll realise just how good we all had it.
You are confusing something. Are you talking about the country that started nearly any war in the recent past, failed to win or loose it and just stretched it out for years while killing thousands of civils for the good? The same country that somehow managed to break the Geneva convention regularly, especially with things like Guantanamo and have no excuse at all? All in the name of spreading democracy, something they not manage to actually implement themselves?
From my POV America is the one country we need to be most afraid of. Mostly because their irrational, war driven, and human rights ignoring behaviour all around the world. Not just in their country
Not really, I think China would have invaded Taiwan at least by now and would be threatening Japan and South Korea but for American power in the region. Why do you think there’s been peace in Europe for so long?
Well if the US hadn’t have got involved at all. There probably wouldn’t be a communist China, and Taiwan would be threatening to invade mainland Japan.
But everything you say is just massive speculation…
As a matter of fact, I think so too! But my question is about why do all governments, including the US gov, have the right to do that to their citizens?
The main problem is that there's a self-governing, democratic nation of 23 million people nearby that the CCP regularly threatens to invade. We've grown rather fond of those people and do a lot of mutually beneficial trade with them.
As long as the CCP threatens other nations, it isn't "internal business".
You are speaking for all mainland Chinese? Ok, well, let me speak for all Australians affected negatively by the b/s extra 'taxes'/trade restrictions/etc put in place by the Chinese government... because they didn't like some things that were said about them?
The USA? Who cares? I'm just speaking out about a civil liberty and you assume that I represent the whole government that uses that liberty as an excuse to play politics. Unlike the CCP members (or their wannabes) I don't base my identity and beliefs around my government and what it does.
You are not the real owner of the country - regardless of what illusion you have. Your government is not either. The big Corp and capital is the REAL owner and they grab you by the balls.
Sounds like soon enough China will export this policy on all Chinese made products all over the world. As a means of creating peace. What’s to stop them from doing this?
> On analysis of the file, I found that the vast majority of the records are actually related to sex, porn, and other smartphone brands. There are mentions of Tibet, Hong Kong, and other religious groups, however, mentions of the CCP and “China” are also included, too
> I think it’s pretty clear that the filter is specifically used for filtering advertisements
The article in the OP covers this directly. A thousand entries with normal advertisement-filter-sounding terms were added, and then everything removed.
I feel compelled to point out that you would know this had you read the article.
This is false. The ad keyword blocklist in the original report had tons of unassuming keywords. The authors cherry-picked a few to support the incredibly boring "China bad" narrative that was probably their goal.
That fell flat, so now there's a new rumor that the See See Pee got caught red-handed and disguised their Totally Real Evil Scary Censoring Algorithm Which Doesn't Work with unassuming keywords.
> Would censor approximately 450 words and phrases, it said. The blocklist wasn’t active, but could be activated remotely. It was filled with political terms, including “Democratic Movement” and “Long live Taiwan’s independence.”
> After the government published its findings, things got weird. The list swelled to more than 1,000 terms, including hundreds of non-political terms like “pornography,” seemingly to turn the political blocklist into something more generic. Then, it disappeared. “They reacted,” Margiris Abukevicius, Lithuania’s vice minister for defense, told me. “It wasn’t publicized from their side.”
So it seems you're the one pulling some mental gymnastics.
> This is false. The ad keyword blocklist in the original report had tons of unassuming keywords.
There is no statistical good/bad measurement if you, as a company, decide to block terminology of political nature.
They blocked pro-Taiwan ads just as they blocked outdated Xiaomi ads. But this doesn't even out the odds anyhow. As long as pro Taiwan ads are blocked, it's effectively being used as a censorship mechanism, and it's nothing else.
Doesn't matter if you sell it as an adblocker. Doesn't matter if you sell it as a filtering system for "security" reasons.
Either block all ads and do the right thing, or block no ads at all. But not this.
The point is that they realized that advertisements are used to organize democratic or revolutionary movements and they blocked it. And that is the censorship others are complaining about.
So what that it has unassuming keywords? If they thought the list might get out, then of course they would add a lot of keywords that don't matter. The computer doesn't get tired because it now has to check for 100x the number of keywords.
There is a reason why people prefer Xiaomi over other brands. What I can remember is pricing, ability to unlock without losing warranty, quality of the hardware.
A different phone like Samsung has problems like warranty being void if flashes, bad hardware, riddled with advertisements as you can't use your own firmware because of previous reasons. In fact, many people in my country choose Xiaomi phones over any brand. Also, Xiaomi provides a better ecosystem like distributions of ROM, flashing software officially.
Other phones like one plus, iPhone has a high price compared to Xiaomi.
The unfortunate fact is the competitor of Xiaomi phone is another Chinese branded phone and
Get a XiaoMi, unlock it, install LineagoOS, do not install Google apps ("gapps"), use microG if you absolutely need to use apps dependent on Google services but try to use them first without, many work fine even though they insist on needing Google services. Just like all other phones you'll still have the proprietary radio firmware running on your device which could try to snoop on you. If you want to avoid this risk either get one of the "Linux phones" with discrete radio hardware (not integrated into the SoC, only connected through a serial line, no access to main memory or storage) or get a dumb phone with a removable battery.
Dumbphones become less of an option lately. The vaccination certificate is on my phone. So are the apps that are mandatory to access my banking. Ao is Authy. Sure, I could carry around a printed-out QR code (how long will that one last?) or switch banks and forget about online banking, and stop using 2FA, just so I can avoid having a smartphone, but eventually, we will see a time when those are no longer options.
I still have a choice, but the time is looming in which I won't anymore - unless I go to live in the woods and start scavenging for beets and beetles in true Brave New World fashion.
The West is instutionally captured by established power structures whose financial and political profit is dependant on a new Cold War, in which the bulk of the Red Scare-ish craziness is realized as yellow perilist propaganda.
On the other hand, watching western actors grovel in public because they had the temerity to call Taiwan a nation makes me inclined to think that there's something actually perilous here.
But Taiwan isn't an independent country. Nobody of note recognises it as such, and heck, they barely claim to be one! It's a vastly complex subject with tons of history, you can't just reduce it to "Taiwan should be called a nation". (they should ideally become an independent nation, but that's besides the point)
Taiwan is self-governing, has its own armed forces, passports, and fully controls its own borders. That makes it a nation, no matter what you want to call it.
A nation requires none of those to be a nation, look at indigenous nations in the US and Canada.
A country needs to be self-governing, autonomous, and recognised by the majority of UN members. Taiwan isn't recognised by any country of note, including the US, so they fail the country test.
Do tell what you think is the criteria for a country being one. Is Transnistria one? South Ossetia? Taiwan? A native American tribe? The US? An American state? It's a trick question!
A native American tribe is a nation, by definition [1]. Heck, the Canadians call theirs "First Nations".
A country requires sovereignty over some land, people, and international recognition. Without the last part, Sealand was a country. Funnily enough, depending on how strict you're with the criteria, some native American tribes are countries, and the US isn't always one due to reservations and states sovereignties.
1 - `a large body of people united by common descent, history, culture, or language, inhabiting a particular country or territory` Oxford English dictionary
And to me its seems the antidote in part is hyper decentralized, cross nation state jurisdictional distributed, and transparent structures of power and wealth that seeks to cannibalize and eventually obsolete the existing financial system.
Only on a few servers in the world where I can see users speaking mandarin, english, farsi, turkish, etc where their wealth goes up as their leaders in their respective countries increase their malfeasance…
Wouldn't solve the issue. You can have censorship with open source software and so long as there is a locked bootloader you couldn't easily replace the software. Also, even if the bootloader was unlocked the majority of people aren't technical enough to replace the software that is doing the censorship.
There is a fundamental contradiction between safety and freedom. The more you are in control, the more you need to know and pay attention too. Any guard rails necessarily limit your choice of path.
In other words, the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, and there is a lot of people who do not want to pay that price. They just need stuff done, no matter what.
Is it by any means surprising? We know every company operating in China comply with the govt. censorship. Some of which is not consistent with our principle of human rights. Do we have any US/European company operating in China which isn't compliant with Chinese laws?
Apart from China, Twitter/FB follow Indian laws in India, blocking users critical of Indian govt. which they wouldn't remove from Global site.
Xiaomi is a private company. They can censor whatever they like. If you don't like it you can create your own multi-billion dollar phone company and spend tens of billions on R&D to manufacture your own cutting-edge flagship phone.
That's a ridiculous take. By that argument all private companies are free to treat their consumers any way they like. Suggesting critical consumers "build their own" is childish and pure fantasy.
There's a reason consumer protection laws exist. The fact that governments haven't caught up to Big Tech doesn't mean companies are free from blame. Particularly ones with direct ties to one of the most oppressive regimes on the planet.
Xiaomi doesn't censor because of a business decision. It censors because it's mandated by the CCP and their relentless efforts of silencing speech that makes China look bad. It's the government equivalent of a sensitive bully that everyone tip toes around because of political and financial reasons. Leaky analogy, but this entire situation is indescribably dumb.
No, it isn't. It's genuine humor; an ironic absurdity derived from a kernel of truth. Best comment of the thread actually; a welcome exception to all of the whataboutery, hair splitting and reading comprehension mishaps.
Though I'd argue this is not the place for such comments. It only further perpetuates the lowbrow "discussion" on a very sensitive topic that, if nowhere else, this forum should be above of.
From the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union:
Article 11
Freedom of expression and information
1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.
And now look what that means in reality. Virtually every single European country forbids certain political speech (mostly this is about fascism or communism, but Hungary has started to use this to surpress LBGT expression). And that's just the start, once you dig deeper you will find all kinds of laws chipping away on that "fundamental right".
When no one has an answer to a complex problem, quietly get out of the room and work on something simple. That produces the best outcome. Cuz you know 2 things are true - there are problems the chimp troupe cant solve And there are people in the room who will never admit it.
Europe is too fragmented to come up with a response to totalitarian CCP regime. Heck even in the USA the CCP has successfully drafted think tanks, Hollywood, NBA players [0] to tow their line and quell resistance to Tibet, Taiwan, Uygher atrocities etc.
So, just like Apple, Facebook, and Twitter regularly policing their platforms and stop apps, websites, etc., according to their national interests and political/cultural fashions?
"It's ok when we do it" - and when you point it out, ofcourse "that's whatabboutism" (plus, "our targets deserve it").
There’s a huge difference between a private company banning someone from their platform and a government that has a secret police which takes you away at night to a labor camp because you didn’t simp for the People’s party.
The difference is that Twitter isn't obligated to provide you a platform to spout Trump conspiracy theories, or whatever, but in most Western countries with the Rule of Law you have a right to not be extrajudicially disappeared by secret police.
A, the "it's OK when it happens to the bad people, especially on my opposite side of the potitical spectrum" argument.
"Trump conspiracy theories": Bad.
"WMDs, video with prostitutes in Russia, and the Steele Dossieur": Good.
(plus, we'll self-critique ourselves, several years down the line, when it doesn't matter anymore, e.g. after the war was declared, the elections over, etc., so that makes us legit).
I don't think it is a strawman at all. You don't have to like Trump, not at all actually and I don't say disliking him is unreasonable.
That people don't care about being lied to is their problem. Russia is a political adversary, but don't try to convince people you think critically. That would be absolutely ridiculous for anyone part of that discussion. If people dislike impolite statements more than war too, well, just don't argue about morality please or the same ridiculousness continues.
I don't think Trump is a good candidate to be president. But his opposition was a laughing stock.
Twitter decided they want to join the conspiracies about Russian interference. They are free to do that. But don't complain about other conspiracies either.
Is this satire? You don’t see a difference between secret police disappearing political dissidents, and Twitter telling you to sell your racism somewhere else?
Yeah, political dissidents don't dissapear - yet, I'll give you that. That's mostly because the system is rigged so that they don't have much impact anyway, they're organically lost in the noise.
In times where there's more fear about dissidents, you get McCarthyism, blacklists, and people fired from their jobs, Hoover's FBI blackmailing politicians and journalists, and so on. And even in more benign times, from MLK to SDS members, and from human rights activists to Kent State students, had taps on them, police records in the tens of thousands of pages, intimidation, and attempts to frame them with drugs, snitches and other BS. Heck, even John Lennon, a harmless famous pop culture figure if I ever saw one, had FBI records the size of a small library.
And this goes all the way to modern OWS members, environmental and political activists, black rights activists, character-assasinated journalists (from Garry Webb to Greenwald), and so on.
And if we extend it to the "but they deserve it, no?", war on terror, I don't see much of a difference between a state with black sites, extra-judicial drone killings, and off-shore off-due-process camps, with people exposing state crimes like Manning in prison and Snowden in exile...
You mean private companies that have government-enabled monopolies and work together to shut people out of interacting in society, all while getting ban-lists from NGOs funded by billionaires?
I'd rather have the oppressive government, which ostensibly creates rules to benefit the country as a whole, than be ruled by the whims of a network of billionaires.
What's the difference? Is Xiaomi not afforded the same control as Twitter? The same oft-repeated argument applies: if you don't like it, buy another phone.
To note: I think this is abhorrent, and really my point is I wish Twitter didn't censor or editorialize either.
The difference is that Xiaomi does not own your phone, Twitter does own their platform.
To make it easy. I believe you don't allow anyone to come into your home and give you lectures about politics, but you would be pretty outraged if your homebuilder would have placed a microphone camera into your home and if you say the wrong words, e.g. the toilet stops working.
Huh? I would say there is a very non-arbitrary difference between buying a phone or logging into some service. I mean in one instance you actually buy a physical thing that you own, for the other you use someone else property.
> What's the difference? Is Xiaomi not afforded the same control as Twitter?
No. Of course not.
How can you honestly believe, that a smartphone producer controlling what you can access _on the internet_, is the same thing, as an online platform having a say in what happens on _their_ platform?
I really don't understand how it's any different. If I sell you a phone why should I be obligated to allow you to do _anything_ on it? Not to mention there's already an extremely strong precedent for suppliers controlling what you are allowed do on your phone (see: iOS and the App Store).
If you don't like it don't buy my phones. Again, I'm largely playing devil's advocate here. I'd much rather live in a world where we stop saying "but it's a private company" as a catch-all.
If you sell me a phone, and then deny me the right to use it as phone, then you are breaking the law. At least where I live. I would be able to demand a refund, and the Company could be penalized for lying about what they sell.
You are being absurd.
Also, private businesses should always be able to enforce their rules on their platform/property, as long as they don't discriminate against protected classes like ethnicities, genders, sexualities, etc.
Otherwise you could just shit on the floor of a restaurant, and they could do nothing about it.
> Also, private businesses should always be able to enforce their rules on their platform/property, as long as they don't discriminate against protected classes like ethnicities, genders, sexualities, etc.
> Otherwise you could just shit on the floor of a restaurant, and they could do nothing about it.
While they both fall under the broad umbrella of 'ownership', I find it deeply misleading to equate Twitter, Inc.'s ownership of the URL twitter.com/XxxBloodNinjaXxx to your fellow citizen John Q. Smalltownrestauranteur's ownership of a floor that he personally cleans with a mop every evening.
They are two form of ownership that have very little in common, and naïvely treating the owners as if they were equals and had the same power leads to poor policy.
It's true that companies normally have no way to really severely sanction you, unless they are in cahoots with governments (plenty of examples of that in history), or unless you consider closing your accounts and banning you is a severe punishment (in this day and age losing your online accounts - or worse bank accounts and such - can indeed have severe effects on your personal and professional life, but it still isn't the same as throwing you in prison).
But the broad societal effect of companies censoring things is more or less the same whether they did that on their own or were instructed by the government. What prevents this a little right now is that we do not have a truly monopolistic landscape in that matter, at least when it comes to online services. You basically need facebook and google and twitter (and tiktok) to all decide on a certain topic to become non-grata to effectively censor a topic enough to vanish it from most public discussion (small services will populate only by people interested in the topic, but the way to "get the message out" will be gone). The governments are more effective by forcing all the big players into compliance. Regardless, the threat of big companies looks very real to me. and the trend goes to big companies consolidating their power more and more.
It's also good to remember there are companies more powerful than FAANG from the perspective of (specific groups of) regular citizens: banks, credit card companies, ISPs, utility companies, health insurers and other insurers, the company that sells you "copyrighted and patented" seed or DRM-enabled tractors, home owners associations, potentially your own employer, to name a few.
Last time I checked, Xiaomi was a private company. Sure, they may have done this with government influence, but that's something not unheard of in the west.
That’s not the point. OP tried to draw a comparison that private enterprises in the US do the same thing — they do not. The false equivalence ends at the point where the CCP actively controls what these companies do in terms of enforcement, and the mass surveillance apparatus is intrinsically linked.
> That’s not the point. OP tried to draw a comparison that private enterprises in the US do the same thing — they do not.
FB/GOOG absolutely do. You may trust the USG or the companies it pressures into this domain of behavior more than the CCP/Xiaomi (or may not - it is not relevant to this point) but the comparison is there.
Right, but that’s kind of the irony — the collection of atrocities that stain the tapestry of America’s history are readily accessible, actively acknowledged on repeat on social media (ad infinitum at times, even), and (mostly, depending on locale) even taught in public schools. Trying to even discuss the notion on WeChat could send you to reeducation camps. Here it’s a series of chapters in textbooks.
I first learned of my state, Washington, and the abuses of its Klickitat people in 5th grade and continued to learn of the Native massacres through middle school all the way through to the end of the high school.
There's no day in the US where remembering a day equivalent to violently pancaking protestors beneath tank treads (take your pick of our atrocities) was censored everywhere as was the case recently on the day of the Tiananmen Square massacre in China.
It's amazing that people still have their heads in the sand about this when evidence to the contrary comes out regularly, e.g. PRISM, CIA coordination with the LA Times and New York Times, and Biden's press secretary Psaki directly saying they work with social media companies to determine censorship policies.
The US government has long outsourced legally questionable things to "private" companies (corporations are actually a government invention). But in the last year it has gotten extremely bold about it - holding press conferences where in they bragged about directing Facebook on which accounts to censor for "misinformation". Obviously government censorship, and obviously illegal - despite the chorus of "actually" from people rushing in with their index fingers raised.
The point shouldn't be "your bad behavior justifies my bad behavior", it should be this: folks in the valley ceded the moral high ground in the pursuit of short term political interests. There is a cost associated with that, which can be paid in many different ways. The right way would be acknowledging the mistake and a rededication to first principles... but obviously that isn't going to happen. Instead, hypocrites will be forced to perform mental gymnastics in order to preserve their working model of the world without admitting fault - it is exhausting, ineffective, and soul crushing... but they'll do it.
>I'm not sure you would find censorship of terms like “Democratic Movement” and “Long live Taiwan’s independence.” on Other platforms.
Yeah, on US tech platforms you can promote Taiwan's independence and criticize China's national interests, I'll give you that!
It's like the old joke, where the American says that he's free-er as he can go to Times Square with a bullhorn megaphone and openly criticize the US Predident.
To which the USSR guy counters that he's equally free, as he is also perfectly allowed to go to the Red Square and openly criticize the US Predident.
>not sure if you're intentionally comparing things like child porn to democracy as equally deserving of censorship but that's how i read it.
I wrote censoring based on "national interests" (not to mention petty political partisan censorship), but you took it that I was complaining about them censoring "child pornography". "Think of the children", much?
I don't think that censoring people from Snowden and wiki-leaks (banned on several instances, which corporations even disabling their way to accept donations), to people writing on the wrong side of the political and being banned for "fake news" (while the "legit" sources touted BS like the Steele Dossier, that now, years after it doesn't matter anymore, do a 180-turn on), amounts to "child porn".
Twitch etc have precisely such lists of words. Democratic movement is an idea that threatens the Chinese power structure - things that you probably don't like are a threat the American power structure. Just because you also personally find them kooky or immoral is irrelevant
CP is the exception that proves the rule in the concept of liberal communication.
... In the old definition of "proves" as in "tests," because any process that greenlights CP is wanting. So it's the one you go to as a litmus test for whether or not the question of censorship vs. open speech on the table is worth spending energy discoursing on.
W-What? Are you suggesting that an instrument for censorship could be used for anything other than its stated purpose?! The West has always been the place for free speech and tolerance!
I'm not sure you would find censorship of terms like "Uighur are not in camps" on Twitter and Facebook. Because as per US foreign policy, "denying" those claims is not allowed
Now nothing. No one who gives even one single solitary fuck about Chinese influence was buying Xiaomi phones. These phones are for the overwhelmingly dominant portion of the market that just does not care.
Recently I had a problem that the phone nagged me about "activating" the 2nd SIM card at boot if the "Find my device" Xiaomi functionality was enabled. It seems to be a part of the tracking functionality if my phone gets lost. The "activation" of the SIM card failed every time, but it sent a SMS to a UK number and billed me about 0,17€ for it. I only figured it out when I saw my phone bill.
I had an earlier Xiaomi phone and I recorded all my phone calls on it. The creepy thing is that I didn't know that Xiaomi was sycing all my files with Xiaomi Cloud.