#Newspaper

Xi Jinping urges for disease control; face masks in China sold out in a day

(21 Jan) As the new Chinese pneumonia spread across regions and cities, General Secretary Xi Jinping spoke for the first time yesterday, urging officials to take adequate measures to halt its outbreak. Shortly after his speech, netizens realized that just within a day, almost all face masks on #Taobao were sold out. Sales jumped by more than ten times compared to when the new coronavirus was first reported.

Even before Xi’s speech, as the severity of the epidemic worsened, specialised medical masks and 3M brand masks were sold out in a day. Most items, including anti-pollen respirators, were out of stock in the 3M Tmall flagship store. Product webpages displayed “out of stock” and “sold out in your district” messages.

A similar situation where almost all masks were sold out was found on JD and Suning, two other online shopping platforms. Suning went a step further, imploring citizens to take preventative measures against the epidemic with a slogan, “Wear a mask, stay away from the virus.”

Hong Kong’s online shopping platform, #HKTVmall, also experienced a shortage of medical masks.

Source: Unwire
https://bit.ly/2G88dO8

#WuhanPneumonia #Xi

#NetizensVoice #ChineseApps

This is too scary, the era of big data, I...

Editor’s note: From the internet censorship to facial recognition and more recently, the health code, China has been establishing policies to control the human behaviour of Chinese people. However, cannot hold the fire, it is possible that Chinese people ,like the one who posted the above concern to the internet, are going to have more doubts about the Chinese apps, the monitoring and the Chinese government.

(16 Aug) This could be the most horrifying photo I have seen recently!

I have heard people say that Taobao may monitor the keyboard, search history and even sound [from microphone] for big data analysis and goods recommendation. I was doubtful about this and thought that maybe it is possible, but not to that god-like extend...

But the fact has exceeded my imagination!

The 25kg skimmed formula powder... My god... Even without asking we know that this is not any common product...

Yesterday I bought a chair and the seller packed the chair with this bag [of the 25kg formula powder]. With no verbal description, no taking of photos, no word-typing, under zero actions [regarding the packaging], today my Taobao homepage recommended me product in the same packaging!

I then recalled the memory. Yesterday, the only action related to Taobao was when I was installing the chair, I opened up Taobao and bought other goods on the website. Does that mean that when I opened up the Taobao page, my camera was working? Was it scanning the image beside me?!

Source: TG Channel
Translated by: Hong Kong Echo

Further reading:
Taiwan tells Taobao e-commerce site to re-register or leave island
https://bit.ly/31zbW2A

#BigData #Surveillance #Taobao #Privacy

#Newspaper

Taobao online store reply: Taiwan is an independent country; a shop staff was laid off to learn the CCP’s online marketplace’s responsibility, following by online troll complaint

A China netizen, was shopping at Taobao online store and asked “is Taiwan belonged to China?” to a shopkeeper who responded “no, Taiwan is an independent country”. After many Chinese Internet Troll (aka Little Pinks, pro-CCP youths who use to spread CCP’s stances and messages attacking anti-China expression) crazily criticized Taobao and the shopkeeper, a shop staff was laid off to accept the responsibility. As usual, the shop was make to reply “China Taiwan is an inalienable part of CCP China”.

According to the Guancha (a CCP online media), when a China netizen shopped at the Rivsea online shop under Taobao, he asked the shopkeeper such question. He then got a response from the shopkeeper in a negative attitude saying, “Taiwan is an independent country, all along and forever, there is never CCP Taiwan”.

The netizen was then indignant, calling group of Little Pinks to attack Taobao and the e-shop. Shortly after, the e-shop announced that it laid off the replying staff, and supported “China Taiwan is an inalienable part of CCP China” and “One China (CCP) Policy”.

#China #Taiwan #NotPartOfChina #LittlePink #Taobao

Source: Apple Daily Taiwan

Translated by: Hong Kong Echo

Taobao, Baidu Cloud Storage Service Slammed for Piracy in US’ 2020 Review of Notorious Markets

Several Chinese websites, including Taobao and Baidu Wangpan, are among those named notorious markets for counterfeiting and piracy in an annual review by the US Trade Representative’s (USTR), published on 14 January. Calling out 39 websites and 34 physical markets on their involvement in acts of piracy and infringements detrimental to American intellectual properties, economy and consumers, the report also names a number of brick-and-mortar markets in China, including the Huaqiangbei Electronics Mall in Shenzhen and Xiushui Street in Beijing. It further notes that China remains a major source of physical piracy, having accounted for 92 percent of the total value of pirated imports seized by US Customs in 2019.

In the report, the USTR says that commercial-scale copyright infringement and piracy activities cause US businesses economic losses. The purpose of the report, it says, is to encourage the government and the private sector to take action to reduce piracy and copyright infringement, and a focus this year is how e-commerce platforms are contributing to copyright infringement.

Source: Stand News #Jan15

#US #China #USTradeRepresentative #USTR #NotoriousMarkets #Taobao #Baidu #Piracy #Copyright

https://bit.ly/3iXjkvV

#IntellectualProperty
Illegal downloads of #Netflix #Korea's original series "#SquidGame" are circulating in #China with #Mandarin subtitle

//Netflix is not available in China. Technically, people in China shouldn't be able to access the series due to the nation’s #GreatFirewall, but many are watching it anyway through illegal streaming and download websites.

Many Koreans are expressing disdain toward the rampant online piracy of Korean content in China, and the popularity of “Squid Game” has made the issue much more tangible...

“Even though Netflix is not available in China and the Chinese government has been pushing back against Korean content in recent years, there are always websites that distribute Korean shows illegally,” said Park Kyung-suk, a history professor at Yonsei University who specializes in modern Chinese history.

“When I was living in China, I found out some websites even charge money for Korean content that they pirated. Even when a website gets taken down, another one springs up right away.” 


According to the Korea Copyright Protection Agency, China is the top country of illegally distributing Korean cultural content — including television shows, films, webtoons and music — over the past five years. From 2017 until September this year, over 85,000 of the total 411,319 cases of copyright violation regarding Korean content happened in China, followed by the Philippines and Vietnam. Although not surprising considering China’s vast population, many Koreans express disdain that such a large viewership is consuming Korea’s intellectual property illegally. 
  
“The disdain boils down to the fact that although China consumes a large volume of Korean content, the Korean firms that created them receive none of the profit that they rightfully deserve,” said Lee Gyu-tag, an associate professor of cultural studies at George Mason University Korea.//

Source: Korea JoongAng Daily #Oct6
https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/2021/10/06/entertainment/television/squid-game-china-netflix-dalgona/20211006171306929.html

#StreamingWebsite #Illegal #CCP #Merchandise #Taobao #Copyright

#Surveillance
Portable charger in China Turned into Eavesdropping Device and GPS Locator

In China, a portable charger can become an eavesdropping device and a GPS locator. Acoording to Chinese media, with the installation of SIM card, such portable charger can eavesdrop a long distance away and locate the user accurately.

These devices come in various colours and models, but most have the functionality of "remote monitoring recording" and "precise positioning".

They cost from RMB300 to RMB600 and can be bought on some online platforms.

In China, a journalist from #Banyuetan (#半月談) successfully modifies a portable charger from a store with RMB300. He downloads a "#GPS365" app onto his phone. After logging in with the username and password given by the seller, the screen shows the device location, tracking record, contact list, messages etc.

The journalist puts "location" in trial and finds out that the activity tracking of the user can be seen clearly with the portable charger. Even places like underground and car parks can still be accurately shown on the system.

The staff told the journalist that the charger could record sound from the surroundings and automatically send the recording to the phone once the environment noise exceeds 50dB with "Sound Control Convo (#聲控語聊到)" installed in the app. The portable charger can also pick up phone calls automatically.

Source: RFA #Jul27
https://www.facebook.com/454004001340790/posts

#GPS #SoundControl #Tracking #Taobao #Privacy #Security #PrecisePositioning #MadeinChina

Cyberspace Administration of China: Already Held 30 Large IT Companies' Algorithm Technologies

Cyber Administration of China (#CAC) indicated on #Aug12 that 30 top IT companies have submitted part of their algorithm details, such as how to collect personal data and how to set up individual recommendation content. 

Companies includes #Tencent, #TikTok under #ByteDance, #MeiTuen, #iFeng, #Weibo, #Youku, #Kuaishou, #Baidu, #Sina, #Xiaomi, #WeChat, and #Tmall and #Taobao under #Alibaba.

#Bloomberg report stated that China can have full grasp of every move done by the citizens on the internet, and even all purchase detail and personal information can be seen clearly via the relevant enterprises and applications.

The CAC passed the regulations on algorithm recommendation in March this year, requiring all enterprises to reveal the algorithm used in every application.

Nominally, they can solve the issue of data misuse and enhance cyber security. But once when the authority obtained algorithm technology, they can take further control over web activity and carry out political propaganda.

They even can take "National Security" as an excuse, to obtain citizens' and companies' information.

Source: PC Market #Aug17
https://www.pcmarket.com.hk/china-netcom-algorithm-technology-of-30-technology-giants-has-been-mastered/?fbclid=IwAR3nrfecOdr8bYlAdIkaE3S783sF8pEprBrq_7Jg46s3lLXzzi1Pv8aSX0k

#CyberAdministrationofChina #surveillance #NationalSecurity #Webtracking #AlgorithmTechnology