Chinese database detailing 2.4 million influential people, their kids, their addresses, and how to press their buttons revealed
- Reference: 1600151224
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/09/15/china_shenzhen_zhenhua_database/
- Source link:
That company is Shenzhen Zhenhua and the academic is [1]Chris Balding , an associate professor at the Fulbright University Vietnam.
Balding and security researcher Robert Potter have co-authored a [2]paper [PDF] claiming the trove is known as the “Overseas Key Information Database” (OKIDB) and that 10 to 20 per cent of it appears not to have come from any public source of information. The co-authors do not rule out hacking as the source of that data, but also say they can find no evidence of such activity.
“A fundamental purpose appears to be information warfare,” the pair stated.
Balding [3]wrote on his blog that the database contains the following:
The information specifically targets influential individuals and institutions across a variety of industries. From politics to organized crime or technology and academia just to name a few, the database flows from sectors the Chinese state and linked enterprises are known to target.
The breadth of data is also staggering. It compiles information on everyone from key public individuals to low level individuals in an institution to better monitor and understand how to exert influence when needed.
The database includes details of politicians, diplomats, activists, academics, media figures, entrepreneurs, military officers and government employees. Known crime figures are also listed. Subjects’ close relatives are also listed, along with contact details and affiliations with political and other organisations.
In the paper, the pair said all that data allows Chinese analysts “to track key influencers and how news and opinion moves through social media platforms.”
“The data collected about individuals and institutions and the overlaid analytic tools from social media platforms provide China enormous benefit in opinion formation, targeting, and messaging.”
It gets worse: “From the assembled data, it is also possible for China even in individualized meetings be able to craft messaging or target the individuals they deem necessary to target.”
Balding said the database is “technically complex using very advanced language, targeting, and classification tools.”
But it was also hard to investigate, as parts were reportedly corrupt.
Balding therefore shared the data trove with Potter - of Australian security firm Internet 2.0 - to help make it accessible. The results were shared with select, non- Reg media outlets.
The Register has sought comment from Balding and Internet 2.0 but had not received a reply at the time of writing so we are reliant on reportage that suggests the database is not the result of hacking or cracking, instead relying on open source intelligence. Some reports suggest that the database includes open material collated from social networks, news stories and other public records such as accounts of trials or financial records.
FTC kicks feet through ash pile that once was Cambridge Analytica with belated verdict [4]READ MORE
As users of such services do not expect or consent to the data they share being compiled into dossiers, the existence of the database has been likened to other infamous data collection incidents such as the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
The academic thinks the database is worrying because “Chinese intelligence, military, and security agencies use the open information environment we in open liberal democracies take for granted to target individuals and institutions.”
In a [5]second post Balding said the database matters because “What cannot be underestimated is the breadth and depth of the Chinese surveillance state and its extension around the world.”
“The world is only at the beginning stages of understand how much China invests in intelligence and influence operations using the type of raw data we have to understand their targets.”
Analysis
Your humble hack and every other Register journalist is listed in several databases compiled using a combination of the stories we write on this site, our social media output, records of telephone conversations and observed behaviour at real world events. Those databases are used to attempt to influence what we write. When the data is held by a public relations firm it is proprietary. When it is collected by media database companies they sell access to it as-a-service.
Some of our production and back office team are listed in databases based on the likelihood they will sign off on purchases of myriad goods and services The Register needs to operate. The Register ’s owners are listed in databases based on publicly available financial data and subsequently targeted with products and services that someone thinks are suitable for business owners.
A lot of these databases produce not much more than poorly targeted sales pitches or, for the editorial team, near-daily press releases about new bitcoin startups that will overturn the global financial system by next Tuesday.
Happily none of those startups, PR firms, database companies or vendors possess a world-spanning security and intelligence apparatus or attempt to influence foreign nations.
Snowden was right: US court deems NSA bulk phone-call snooping illegal, possibly unconstitutional, and probably pointless anyway [6]READ MORE
China does. And China uses them to conduct operations ranging from protesting against media coverage of its affairs, attempting to influence university curricula, suborning elected representatives and more. With a list that details targets’ relatives, who knows what other tactics a determined foe could employ to have someone influential dance to their tune?
Which is why this database is important, because it shows that China has a well-organised effort to give its influence operations the information they need to be efficient. Or ruthless.
Having said that, it would be more of a surprise if China did not have such a database and ignored the chance to compile it using the data so many of us carelessly scatter across the internet each day, or which is published in the public interest.
“Open liberal democracies must consider how best to deal with the very real threats presented by Chinese monitoring of foreign individuals and institutions outside established legal limits,” Balding wrote, before suggesting: “Increased data protections and privacy limits should be considered.”
“The threat of surveillance and monitoring of foreign individuals by an authoritarian China is very real,” he concluded. “Open liberal democratic states can no longer pretend these threats do not exist. Today’s database is compiled primarily from open sources, other databases China holds present much greater risks to Chinese and foreign citizens. ®
If you have information that no one else has, you can tip us off [7]securely using this form , or contact us [8]here .
Get our [9]Tech Resources
[1] https://fulbright.edu.vn/our-team/christopher-balding/
[2] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3691999
[3] https://www.baldingsworld.com/2020/09/14/statement-on-shenzhen-zhenua-data-leak/
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2019/12/07/ftc_cambridge_analytica_ruling_facebook/
[5] https://www.baldingsworld.com/2020/09/14/personal-statement-on-shenzhen-zhenhua-data-leak/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/03/nsa_metadata_collection/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/Author/Email/encrypted-message-desk
[8] https://www.theregister.com/about/company/contact/
[9] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Good old propaganda
The Cambridge Analytica scandal resulted in a database of over 70 million people that was used by the Cruz and Trump campaigns for directed propaganda.
Makes the Chinese effort of 2.4 million entries look amateurish by comparison.
Did I miss it, but how did they come about getting access / a copy of this database?
Also as said, it would be surprising if China (or any other country for that matter) didn't compile this type of information.
So true. And really, how can it be undemocratic when China is merely follows in the footsteps of that bastion of democracy, the US, which has been doing both mass and individual surveillance for years?
If the actions themselves are bad, then liberal democracies should not do them either. Otherwise, complaining that others do something while doing it yourself, that smacks of hypocrisy.
Want to give lessons to the world? Start by being an example to the world.
You can joke, but it is real. China spends big money on surveillance. Most Western Governments are too cheap to do it effectively (and because there is a choice of Government, they don’t do it as intrusively)
I'm not joking. But you, on the other hand, I'm wondering... You've not heard of the US surveillance programs, their no-fly lists, stingrays, asking for your social network IDs at the border? All on ElReg.
Here in France, the official numbers are of about 10000 people that are monitored by the government, who have not been convicted of anything, but are deemed to be "of interest", sometime merely because a neighbor sent an anonymous letter. They're not made aware of it. In some cases, that blocks their career, and they're still not made aware of it. There's no appeal or anything they can do. It's well-known, what I told you was on TV and radio.
But since some of those people are brown-skinned, nobody cares. Actually, some mainstream politicians repeatedly said all the brown people on the list should be put in concentration camps, indefinitely.
So remind me again - what is China doing, exactly?
Down the back of the sofa. It was also labelled "top secret Chinese database of influential people.accdb" and has absolutely and I need to be really clear on this nothing whatsoever to do with him losing his job in China for calling them out on their human rights record then having to leave the country concerned about his safety. No conflict of interest there at all.
How many does that database say read El-reg ?
This is important to me; I form my opinions from several places, including the comments pages here. It would be easy to place "desirable" opinions here to influence individuals known to read The Register.
I doubt that I will have featured as important, but my views could be polluted through association with those worthy of being targeted.
Re: How many does that database say read El-reg ?
If I were an advertiser I would definitely post on appropriate fora rather than pay for a banner ad.
Re: How many does that database say read El-reg ?
Finding where young low level activists already indoctrinated into following the party line hang out and then using subtle methods to ‘inform’ their opinion is part of the long game that will be in play, but there are easier places to tinker with than a forum with a high ‘trust no government’ quotient.
Placing opinions desirable to the Chinese* here without triggering a giant WTF response from all and sundry seems a high hurdle compared to most interweb forums, after all, this is EL-reg, home to a readership of analytical & sceptical techies skilled in 'reading between BS statement lines’ and possess the ability to think for themselves (mostly).
Divide & conquer has been the basis for foreign policy in every country looking to exert external influence without incurring the risks & expense of an actual war, find weaknesses that can be exploited and chip away at them. currently in the US it’s the racial divide in policing, in the UK it’s anything to do with empire.
For example we could blame Chinese influence for the current climate of denouncing almost any prominent historical western figure or activity as
* given that we'll poke at any group expanding it's control or spying over us, a lack of articles on Chinese activities would be the only desirable I can spot.
A US academic has revealed the existence of 2.4-million-person database he says is compiled by a Chinese company
Oh well that's it, case closed then. Glad to see the burden of proof is so high nowadays.
Oh....bad....bad....bad.....Nothing Like That Going On in the US or the UK.....No Siree!
....especially not in genteel Cheltenham.
*
But seriously folks....when the China-bashing has lost its lustre......take a look in the mirror.
Re: Oh....bad....bad....bad.....Nothing Like That Going On in the US or the UK.....No Siree!
"But seriously folks....when the China-bashing has lost its lustre......take a look in the mirror."
Last time I checked I never harvested any organs from prisoners. But OK.
Re: Oh....bad....bad....bad.....Nothing Like That Going On in the US or the UK.....No Siree!
Your point being, you're ok with your country doing plenty of bad things, as long as you're able to point to something even worse being done somewhere else?
Great way to give lessons, that. Carry on.
"Balding and security researcher Robert Potter"
For a moment there I was wondering what his lack of hair had to do with anything...
Cheating, cheapskate, scofflaws
They should be paying Google and Facebook for this data like everyone else.
Good old propaganda
Governments have been doing it for years. It doesn’t actually work very well. If your population is well educated...
...oh dear....