2025-07-08
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China's 1.1 billion Internet users churn out more data than anyone else on Earth.
So does the country's vast network of facial recognition cameras.
As autonomous cars speed down roads and flying ones crisscross the skies,
the quality and value of the information flowing from emerging technologies will soar.
Yet the volume of data is not the only thing setting China apart.
The government is also embedding data management into the economy and national security.
That has implications for China and holds lessons for democracies.
China's planners see data as a factor of production alongside labor, capital, and land.
Xi Jinping, the president,
has called data a foundational resource with a revolutionary impact on international competition.
The scope of this vision is unparalleled,
affecting everything from civil liberties to the profits of Internet firms and China's pursuit of the lead in artificial intelligence.
Mr. Xi's vision is being enacted fast.
In 2021, China released rules modeled on Europe's General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR.
Now it is diverging quickly from Western norms.
All levels of government are to marshal the data resources they have.