China undermining internet as a force for good, warns spy chief

Beijing’s censorship and control is threatening the liberal values of the Web, says GCHQ policy boss

A SPY chief at GCHQ has warned that the internet is no longer built on “Western liberal values” owing to the growing influence of China.

The technology powering the internet has for decades been developed and sculpted in the West, but the increasing technological prowess of China now threatens these principles, according to the intelligence agency.

Ann S, Deputy Director of Strategy and Policy at GCHQ, called the transfer of power a “moment of reckoning” for the West as it grapples with the increasing prominence of China’s authoritarian government and its ascent to global superpower status.

“We in the West have been fortunate that a lot of the technology which has driven the internet has been informed by Western liberal and democratic values, but that is not going to be the picture going forward,” she said on-stage at Cheltenham Science Festival.

“So we can see that there is a big shift to the East and there is a potential clash of values there. We know that, for example, the Chinese state’s values are not the values that we hold to be important in the West.

“Collaboration with our partners is absolutely essential. You know, this is a moment of reckoning for the West

‘There is now a very distinct Chinese conception of what the internet should look like in the future’

really.” She added that allies in the West were now attempting to counter this threat by coming up with a set of rules and protocols that transcended international borders.

For example, she said that 61 countries, including the UK and US, recently signed up to a set of digital principles to create a “single global future for the internet”.

This, Ms S added, will be based on “democratic values [such as] respecting user privacy, encouraging competition, encouraging openness and encouraging accessibility”.

But Jamie Susskind, author of The Digital Revolution, said a global framework ensuring the internet is governed in the same way across the world would be “undesirable and unlikely”.

“I think that people living in a country should expect that the laws governing digital technology in their country reflect the values and norms of that place,” he said at the Cheltenham Science Festival, sitting alongside Ms S.

“As long as, important proviso here, it is a democracy with the rule of law. Amongst democracies of the world, I don’t think it’s a bad thing if there is a patchwork of different legal and governance regimes.”

Mr Susskind admitted, however, that this argument “rather falls apart” when applied to authoritarian countries such as China or Turkey.

“I think we’re going to enter a period where there is much more of a clash rather than agreement when it comes to the governance of powerful technologies,” he said, before backing the West’s vision for the web: “I’m prepared to say we are right and the Chinese are not.”