China: ¿Smart killer robots?

A recent report by Accenture Technologies suggests that by 2035 Artificial Intelligence (AI) might add as much as 1.6 percentage points to China’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

The researchers at Accenture argue that to yield maximum economic benefits from AI, China needs to use it as an additional factor of production, relying on AI for intelligent automation, labor and capital augmentation and innovation diffusion.

Analysts from other institutions also support such claim: PricewaterhouseCoopers projected that by 2030 global GDP could increase by $15.7 trillion, with almost half of these gains coming from China. PwC estimates that AI will account for a 26 percent GDP boost, or $7 trillion, in China in the next 13 years.

However optimistic these economic projections sound, rapid development of AI in the PRC might also bring about significant challenges to freedom and security, both in China and beyond: Chinese companies are barely constrained by legal issues over data collection and users’ privacy. They can freely use the data of China’s 750 million internet users, match photos and personal IDs and then train facial recognition algorithms and other types of neural networks on large datasets.

Currently the Chinese government not only does not restrict the uses of personal data by domestic tech giants such as Tencent, Baidu and Alibaba, but actively uses their resources to surveil Chinese citizens: Beijing has successfully used advanced facial recognition systems to analyze data from millions of cameras to track down law violators. On the one hand, this might help police to catch criminals faster. But on the other hand, and bearing in mind that China is more rapidly than any other country moving towards becoming a surveillance state where no one can hide from the government, the AI can also be used to censor online environments and identify people who spread “sensitive” information online. Through the use of the AI, any news considered "not good enough" for the government could be censored automatically as it gains steam, and then relaxed after the storm has passed. And there would be almost no trace that it had ever happened. Applying these techniques to the internal affairs, the possibility of implanting an Smart Dictatorship could be enormous.

Regarding military uses of AI, the U.S. is already alarmed about China potentially using AI for that purposes: In February, Elsa B. Kania, an analyst with The Long Term Strategy Group at the Aspen Institute, testified before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army has reportedly begun incorporating AI into unmanned weapon systems, including UAVs and UUVs: “The Chinese defense industry has likewise made significant progress in its research and development of a range of cutting-edge unmanned systems, including those with supersonic, stealth, and swarming capabilities, but appears to face continued challenges in UAV engines, data links, and sensors,” she said. Of course, U.S. still has an advantage in terms of AI development, but China is catching up fast: Given the amount of resources available in China for the AI development, chances are Beijing will be able to fulfill its goal of becoming the industry leader by 2030.

Japan gets ready for the war

According to the country’s 2014 defense budget, the increased investments in UAVs are necessary to ”...build defense capabilities to ensure security of the seas and airspace surrounding Japan, respond to an attack on remote islands” —a not so subtle reference to the disputed Senkaku Islands, or the Diaoyu as they are known in China.

Although both countries claim their drones will only be used for surveillance purposes, experts warn that the possibility of future drone battles in the region’s airspace is “very high.”: Chinese state media last year reported that Beijing will build 11 drone bases along its coastline to boost ISR missions over the islands, and Japan has positioned itself as one of the key players in the escalating global race for military UAVs, a move that’s controversial both at home and abroad.

China: Getting ready for the UAV war

China's new stealthy Unmanned Aerial vehicle (UAV), dubbed Sharp Sword by the domestic media, shows its eagerness to catch up in the field of drone technology.

It bears a striking similarity in its overall shape to the bat-winged RQ-170 Sentinel, built by the US company Lockheed Martin and operated by the Americans since around 2007. China is thus well-behind the Americans but is fast developing an impressive UAV capability of its own.

What is clear from recent air shows and the Chinese technical press is that China has developed a variety of UAVs matching virtually every category deployed by the US. They range from small tactical drones of limited endurance to much larger systems that look strikingly like US Reaper or Predator models, and just like their US counterparts some of these Chinese drones are equipped with hard-points on their wings to carry munitions.

The two leading players in the drone club - the US and Israel - have developed UAVs for a variety of purposes. These range from intelligence-gathering to strikes against targets on the ground. Not surprisingly, China sees UAVs in exactly the same light. UAVs are fast becoming an especially useful tool for Beijing in monitoring activity over contested areas of the South China and East China Seas. China is believed to have converted a number of out-of-date J-6 fighters into UAVs, which may well be being used to monitor the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands.

China also has the ability to arm some of its drones. Earlier this year, an interview in the Chinese Global Times newspaper provided a striking insight into Beijing's thinking about drones. A senior official in the public security ministry's anti-drugs bureau acknowledged that China had considered using an armed drone against a wanted drug trafficker in northern Burma, also known as Myanmar. In the event the attack was never carried out, but the clear implication is that Beijing has drawn some conclusions of its own from Washington's use of UAVs to take out targets across borders.

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Beijing gets large-scaled UAV industrial base

A large-scaled whole-chain unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) industrial base will settle in southern Beijing’s Daxing District, according to the top management of China Academy of Aerospace Aerodynamics (CAAA) under China Aerospace Sci &Tech Corporation, Beijing Daily reported.

The UAV industrial base, which covers a total area of 134 ha, will be the first of its kind in China. The base will cluster flagship enterprises and regional S&T leaders in the sophisticated industry within three years. It will also develop a top-notch technological service system and explore new modes for commercial application so as to turn itself into a UAV tech and service hub with high value-added.