Imagine living in a place where cameras watch your every move. Where everything you say on social media, your texts, your purchases are all monitored by the government. All of this is factored into a social credit system that scores you as a “troublemaker,” which enables the government to track you, stop you from traveling, detain or attack you at a moment’s notice.
This is the surveillance state that China has made in Tibet, and US tech companies have provided the technology that has fueled this repression for decades.
As I said in ICT’s September 10 statement, I am appalled that US companies have made millions in profits selling to China’s security services, who have imposed an increasingly Orwellian system of surveillance and repression in Tibet and Xinjiang, among other areas. Please stand with us and join our call in urging these companies to immediately sever any remaining business relationships with China’s police state.
SIGN THE OPEN LETTER HERE
You can help put a stop to this injustice. Sign our open letter to Silicon Valley leaders calling on them to stop working with the Chinese government and use your voice to help save Tibet.
The Associated Press recently published a major report on Silicon Valley’s role in helping China become the surveillance superpower it is today. Over the last 25 years, companies like Dell, Nvidia, Thermo Fisher, and IBM have sold technology to the Chinese government that enabled them to monitor and control their population like no other government in history.
In their review of classified and internal documents, AP discovered that US technology plays a role in nearly every aspect of China’s surveillance—what they call “the digital cage.”
- Genetic & DNA surveillance: Biotech company Thermo Fisher’s technology was used by Chinese police to tag millions of Tibetans and Uyghurs so the government could compile lists of ethnic minorities. Huadi, a Chinese defense contractor, worked with IBM to construct a national fingerprint database, and the Chinese police stored genetic data using Dell and Microsoft products.
- Racial targeting: Even in their marketing materials, companies specifically pitched their technologies’ ability to identify people based on race. Dell touted the “all-race recognition” in their AI-powered laptops, while Thermo Fisher’s DNA kits were “designed” for “ethnic minorities like Uyghurs and Tibetans.”
- Suppression of Speech: Dell and Seagate assisted China’s internet police in cracking down on dissent online. And China’s main policing system, “The Golden Shield,” was designed in part by IBM to help censor the internet and target religious minorities like Falun Gong.
- AI and chips: As recently as July, Nvidia is selling H20 chips to China for use in AI, which will doubtlessly be used by China’s military and police. In the past, their chips have been used to train AI patrol drones and “systems to identify people by their walk.” Intel is also involved.
Not only are these companies enabling China’s repression of Tibetans—they are profiting from it through contracts with the military and police.
These are American companies—based in a nation that was built on values of freedom and civil rights. We cannot allow this to continue.
International Campaign for Tibet
P.S. China’s surveillance state is massive and highly advanced—but without American technology, it would be nothing.
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