The Patriot Post® · In Brief: Delete China's Spy App
The Chinese Communist Party is no friend to privacy. And Senator Ben Sasse warns specifically about an app the CCP is demanding of anyone involved with the Olympics:
The Chinese Communist Party is forcing anyone who goes to the 2022 Olympics to download an app called My2022. The stated plan is to use it to monitor “health and travel data” — which, in China’s surveillance dystopia, is sinister enough. But there are even more menacing ways Chairman Xi could use this app to spy on users.
Americans — athletes and attendees alike — should delete the app. And Apple and Google should pull it from their app stores. The Olympics are about celebrating human achievement, not building a massive spy ring for the Chinese Communist Party.
Again, this isn’t new. Sasse explains:
For years, Chairman Xi has advanced tyranny through investments in Chinese technology. In the northwest province of Xinjiang, the CCP has weaponized big data to make his genocide of the Uyghurs both more subtle and efficient. Now, at the Olympics, My2022 provides a new, international test population for CCP experiments with cyber-espionage.
The My2022 app’s origins are sketchy at best. It was developed by a state-run company and initially relied on technology developed by iFlyTek. iFlyTek isn’t just another Silicon Valley-style tech company — it is an active participant in genocide and in the CCP’s surveillance state. The U.S. government has actually blacklisted iFlyTek due to human-rights and security concerns. Americans would be foolish to trust firms such as iFlyTek.
The CCP blurs the line between the private and public sectors in China’s tech economy so much that it is largely imaginary. My2022’s developers have told American companies that they’ve removed iFlyTek technology from the app. But that’s a distinction without a difference. China-based companies are required by law to give the CCP unrestricted access to the user data collected by app.
Information is everything, and it won’t be safe on devices with this app. Sasse says that “flaws” and “massive holes” were likely introduced by CCP design, but regardless will be exploitable. And Sasse also gives a bottom line:
American companies shouldn’t be the CCP’s partners in crime. They have a responsibility to protect our citizens from CCP cyber-espionage. Right now, the way most athletes, coaches, and journalists are downloading My2022 is through Apple and Google’s app stores. It is time for those companies to protect their customers and shut down this spyware.
The only thing that matters to the CCP is its own power. Its members are willing to use whatever technology, bribery, and propaganda they think will secure their tyranny. The Olympics are just another venue for the CCP to project that terrifying vision into the world — and there is no reason American companies should help.
National Review subscribers can read the whole thing here.