Hong Kong, protest, surveillance

-- By YiShinLai - 11 Oct 2019

Introduction

Reminisce of the Tiananmen Square crisis in 1989, the Chinese Communist Party, not used to seeing sustained bouts of civil unrest, is facing an increasing stubborn challenge to its authority in Hong Kong. Following the failed enactment of the Extradition Act, Hong Kongers have taken the streets to demand for political reforms; although, quite ironically, not for anything more than the democracy that was promised to them when the territory was handed over to China from Britain in 1997.

What the student protesters did not have in Beijing exactly 30 years ago (but the Hong Kongers now do), are smartphones capable of transmitting information rapidly to each other. This allows protesters to know where the police are so that they can quickly dissolve and re-congregate at other parts of the city using the efficient subways system. This has severely weakened the police’s efforts to contain the protests simply because they are always one step behind the protestors in this cat-and-mouse chase.

The Mesh network

What the protesters learnt from the 2014 Umbrella Movement was that the information exchanged between themselves were susceptible to falling into the hands of the police since the telecommunication system is state owned and controlled. For them to be ahead of the authorities, they had to find a system to circumvent the normal mode of communication. In comes “Bridgefy”, a mobile phone application that uses a “mesh” network; one that utilizes short-range Bluetooth encrypted connections to form a network connection independent of the internet and the carrier cell masts. Since the protests started, the application has seen a spike in the number of downloads in the city.

All an illusion

Bridgefy is, nevertheless, not impregnable. The police could, at the very least, sign up for the application the same way any protester would, and post fake broadcasts so as to cause confusion amongst the protesters. Such broadcasts could include saying that the police are at a specific location and to avoid it when nobody is actually there, or to direct protesters to another location where the police are lying in wait. Another way to thwart the application’s effectiveness is to push malware through the links sent so as to allow the State to know exactly who and where the users of the application are, and to respond accordingly and effectively. Infiltrating the application is simple considering the vast resources available to the State.

Any notion that the protesters have finally found an advantage against the State is nothing but an amateurish illusion. Whatever edge the protesters find in technology, the State can counter them and do better. The only resistance left for the protestors to put up is to physically anonymize themselves by donning a face mask every time they hit the streets. Not only does this signify some form of unity amongst the protesters, it protects them from being identified. This, however, changed overnight.

The ban on face masks

On October 5, 2019, the Chief Executive of Hong Kong decided to invoke the Emergency Regulation Ordinance to prohibit face marks and other coverings at public gatherings in a bid to deter protestors from hiding their identities. Considering that China has the world’s most powerful facial recognition system which can identify any of its 1.3 billion citizens in 3 seconds with up to 90% accuracy, stripping the face masks off the protesters immediately open them up to the possibility of detention and prosecution. This was, after all, what the State did to people in Xinjiang which led to the arrest and detention of more than a million Muslim Uighur minority, purportedly in the public’s interest to ensure safety and security.

The protesters were keen to make sure the same did not happen to them. In the past month, they began targeting “smart sensor-packed” lamp posts installed all around the city. They have since cut down one and damaged 19 others. The lamp posts are packed with all sorts of connectivity features such as WiFi? and Bluetooth, intended to collect data on traffic, weather and pollution. While its camera function provides visual analysis and has tracking capabilities, the Hong Kong government has said that those functions have yet to be activated, and that there were no plans to do so (although they were reluctant to offer any promise that this was to always remain status quo when directly asked). Even if a promise was made, it is hard not to be skeptical since pressure from the CCP remains a concern, much like how the ex-CEO of Cathay Pacific was forced by the CCP to give up a list of his employees who had joined the protests, something he had resolutely disagreed with.

The law of privacy (if any)

Where then is the law on privacy in all of this? In 1995, the Hong Kong legislation passed the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, touting itself as “Asia’s longest standing comprehensive data protection laws”. The Ordinance outlines how data users should collect, handle, and use personal data with its primary objective to ensure that one personal data “is collected on a fully-informed basis and in a fair manner, with due consideration towards minimizing the amount of personal data collected”. Its key principle is that the use of data should be limited to or related to the original collection purpose.

As with all laws, the devil is in the detail. In this case, the preamble of the exemption clause states that “while data privacy is an important right, the interests protected under the Ordinance have be balanced against other important right or public interest.” Such examples include “crime prevention or prosecution, security and defence…”

Is facial recognition technology a breach of privacy? At first blush, the answer is yes. It is neither collected on a “fully-informed basis” nor is it with any “consideration towards minimizing the personal data collected” since the State does not ask for your permission to install copious numbers of cameras at almost every corner of the streets which are on record mode 24/7. Is it illegal for the State to do so then? Then unfortunate answer is no, since all expectations of privacy crumbles before State security.

Conclusion

So what differentiates a protester in Beijing in 1989 from one in Hong Kong in 2019 with all these technological advancement and laws to ensure that one’s privacy is respected over the long 30 year period? Nothing. As always, the State will end up the victor.

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