China Collects Data From Facebook And Twitter With Rp4.5 Billion Tools

China is reportedly back to spying on foreign countries. (photo credit: Jefferson Santos / Unsplash)

JAKARTA - China is reportedly spying on foreign countries again by using tools as part of its internal internet surveillance network to mine data from Western social media.

The government purchased a newer and more sophisticated data surveillance system to gather information about foreign entities, according to bidding and contract documents for more than 300 Chinese government projects since early 2020. The documents reveal a $320,000 purchase of Chinese state media software. .5 billion to mine data from social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube about well-known foreign media journalists as well as key personnel from politics, business and media circles.

Officials also purchased a $216,000 Beijing police intelligence program targeting Hong Kong and Taiwan and the cyber hub Xinjiang which catalogs Uyghur-language content abroad.

First revealed by the Washington Post, an analyst at China's Central Propaganda Department said the software would allow the country to better understand the underground network of anti-China personnel.

The nation's leaders are also setting up a network of alert systems that will sound real-time alarms for trends that threaten or undermine the nation's interests.

"Now we can better understand the underground network of anti-China personnel," the analyst said.

In fact, China's Central Propaganda Department was once tasked with producing data reports on how negative content related to Beijing's senior leadership spread on Twitter, including individual profiles of academics, politicians, and journalists.

This new program will automatically collect and store data in real-time on Chinese servers for analysis. In fact, this type of data collection is prohibited by Twitter and Facebook, unless prior permission has been given.

"Our API provides real-time access to public data and Tweets only, not personal information. We prohibit the use of our API for surveillance purposes, in accordance with our developer policies and requirements," said Twitter spokeswoman Katie Rosborough.