2024 will perhaps go down in history as the year of elections and more so as the year of democracies. Since January this year, prominent democracies including Bangladesh and Taiwan have already successfully conducted their elections, while other major democratic nations such as the U.S, India, Ukraine, Great Britain, South Africa and a host of other African countries are set to undergo electoral festivities throughout the year. Apart from sharing an election year, all these countries also face the detrimental threat of China’s manipulation and interference within their respective upcoming elections. By projecting technology companies as the face of China’s growth story, not only has the Communist Party of China (CPC) aimed to elevate its global positioning in the technology sector but has also strategically positioned these firms as its extended arms working in different countries. China’s growing dominance in the global technology sector poses significant challenges and risks to democracies, both domestically and internationally. The growing influence over technology led by Chinese companies is a threat all democratic nations must seriously consider especially given that most of such nations are expected to undergo elections this year.
Methods and practices of China’s Election manipulation
The global influence of technology led by Chinese tech giants that have been entrusted by the CPC to take over the global surveillance sector all across the world, is slowly but steadily gaining speed in terms of setting global standards. These technology companies have also been known to closely align with the Party and have played the central role in developing and implementing surveillance technologies in different democracies. These international firms through the practice of facial recognition systems, social credit scoring, and internet censorship tools have already been manipulating citizens through different mediums for China’s strategic interests. Such technologies have enabled the CPC to monitor citizens’ behaviour and as an extension, manipulate their electoral preferences. Moreover, these Chinese tech firms involved in data collection and analytics have been gathering extensive information about users’ preferences and political affiliations which have led to targeted advertising campaigns aimed at specific demographic groups to influence their voting patterns.
This has also been proved by many analysts who have accused Chinese tech giants of enabling information manipulation and disinformation campaigns based on the data collection from consumer platforms. By controlling online platforms and censoring content, these companies have for years been shaping public opinion and spreading government propaganda even to the extent of distorting democratic discourse.
Another prominent strategy deployed by the CPC has been the buying of influence through these resource heavy tech firms. With significant financial resources these companies have influenced elections through campaign contributions, donations to political parties as well as lobbying efforts. These firms have also gained access to political decision-makers and have influenced policy outcomes in the CPC’s favour. One prominent example is the case of Kenny Chiu, a Conservative MP from Canada who sought to introduce the Foreign Influence Registry Bill, which would have made it mandatory for all citizens to declare the source of their foreign funding from international governments. The MP who lost his seat in the 2021 election stated that he was specifically targeted due to a stern stand against the CPC he had taken, mandating each citizen to declare their funding from the CPC. He later claimed to be a target of the CPC’s propaganda and disinformation campaign on WeChat and other prominent social media platforms during last election campaign leading to his loss and an eventual softer approach on China.
The symbiotic relationship between Chinese tech companies and the Party
Unlike their Western counterparts, Chinese tech companies have always operated within a restrictive regulatory environment that has prioritized state control and censorship over individual freedoms in exchange for governmental support and subsidies. This symbiotic relationship between the Chinese government and tech giants witnessed domestically as well as in foreign countries has enabled the CCP to leverage technological capabilities to manipulate information, especially during elections. The recent example of Chinese attempts to manipulate the Taiwanese election held in January is a case in point of the same. Taiwan’s foreign minister Joseph Wu revealed in January, that Beijing had launched significant efforts to influence the electoral results of the all-important elections; mostly due to how close the results were in terms of vote counts as well as the strategic importance of having a pro-China candidate win the said elections. The CPC has been notorious with its interference in Taiwanese politics. The Party has for years been deploying various means including cyber-attacks, disinformation campaigns and so on to alter the course of a free and fair electoral process. According to a recent report published by Microsoft, Chinese social media accounts played a large part in information operations spreading falsified news in order to influence voting patterns. As per the report ‘an elite group within (China’s) Ministry of Public Security’ was orchestrating misinformation as well as fake news to alter the course of the election results, much in favour of the CPC. Owning to tactics such as these, Taiwan has been the largest recipient of foreign-created disinformation, according to monitoring groups that have also indicated strong Chinese presence in such dissemination.
Taiwan is however not the only victim to China’s methods that are dangerous to democracies around the world. U.S cybersecurity firms have recently discovered the extent of Chinese presence on social media platforms. Mandiant, a prominent cybersecurity firm stated that a hacker group by the name of Dragonbridge had infiltrated American media platforms and had been questioning the ‘efficacy of democracy’ while instigating users to ‘root out the ineffective system’ for the larger good. The propagandic content also explicitly asked citizens to use ‘violence against police officials’ that sought to prevent them in the process. These forms of campaigns were also recorded on Twitter, which had claimed to ban accounts that were propagating violent contents.
Another cybersecurity company Recorded Future had identified a similar Chinese state-sponsored social media campaign directed towards dividing U.S. voters by manipulating sentiments of citizens around divisive political topics. Topics such as racial injustice, police brutality, and U.S. military assistance to Ukraine were seen to be important in dividing voters and caused severe frictions among voters. Meta, too, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram ended up banning fake accounts originating in China that targeted voters on both sides of the political aisle. Given the rise of such cyber infiltrations, Chinese cyber companies have become far more sophisticated in their approach of influencing voting behaviours. However, with China’s Ministry of Public Security openly being named in various reports, it only remains an open secret indicating the CPC’s direct involvement in such matters.
The use of such technology to influence the behaviour of voters is not only a concern faced by a few countries but also by those that may not be seen as friendly by Beijing. Thus China’s dominance in such sectors should be a cause for concern to all like-minded nations that view democracy as the a value system than mere formalities.
Among the more pressing concerns surrounding China’s tech dominance is also the proliferation of surveillance technologies and digital authoritarianism. Chinese tech firms, such as Huawei, ZTE, and Hikvision, export surveillance equipment and expertise to both democracies as well as authoritarian regimes globally, enabling repressive governments to monitor and suppress dissenting voices. These methods of surveillance as well as the digital infrastructure poses a serious threat to free and fair elections by enabling regimes to target political opponents and dissenters. Moreover, China’s growing dominance in critical infrastructure and emerging technologies also poses systemic risks to electoral integrity which has in return deteriorated the democratic value of the country. The control over social media presence as well as content modulation has granted Chinese actors the capability to disrupt electoral processes through cyberattacks and misinformation campaigns undermining the sovereignty and security of democratic nations. The upcoming elections in U.S and India in this regard are under serious watch given the adversarial role both countries have in, for China’s interest.
China’s tech dominance poses a multidimensional threat to elections worldwide, undermining democratic principles while also amplifying geopolitical tensions that can lead to significant global consequences. In order to safeguard democracy in the age of technology, collective efforts are perhaps the only appropriate response to China’s strategy. Failure to address the perils of China’s tech dominance risks the overall democratic nature and value of the democratic world, thus also compromising on the foundation of democratic governance as well as jeopardizing the future of a peaceful international order.