The Economist Asia - 27.01.2018

26 China The EconomistJanuary 27th 2018

2 want to use the data in pursuit of global

dominance in the business ofAI. So they

have an incentive to collect as much data

as possible and support lax data-protec-

tion laws. On the other hand, consumers

in China are demanding tighter protection,

while their counterparts in the West,

where the Chinese companies are trying to

expand their business, have even greater

privacy concerns.

For the past year, companies have been

debating how to strike the right balance.

Now, it seems, consumer pressure may be

winning out. Frank Fan, a data-security ex-

pert, argues that recent events will prove a

turning point. “In the future,” he says,

“data-protection policies will determine

whether a company will succeed or not.”

Nie Zhengjun, Ant Financial’s chief pri-

vacy officer (yes, they have one) claims that

Chinese consumers are “no longer content

with preventing information from being

used for fraudulent purposes...Now they

want control in protecting their privacy.”

The question is how these shifts in con-

sumer attitudes and company behaviour

will affect the government, which is gath-

ering vast quantities of personal informa-

tion without the public’s consent. This in-

cludesDNA data taken from millions of

people, includingall inhabitantsof the

western province of Xinjiang. The govern-

ment’s aim is to use the data to help it to

strengthen social control.

In 2017 the government launched an in-

spection campaign examining the privacy

policies of ten internet firms. At least five

were found to have improved data protec-

tion by making it easier for users to delete

personal information. This enabled the

government to boast about the security of

China’s data-protection laws and claim

that it was making personal information

safe from criminals.

At the same time, however, the cyber-

security law required that copies of all per-

sonal data gathered by operators of “criti-

cal information infrastructure” in main-

land China must be stored there. This has

fuelled suspicions that the government

wants to be able to gain access to them, ei-

thercovertly or by putting pressure on

data-storage companies. At the end of Feb-

ruary, Apple will comply with the new law

by handing management of the data of

iCloud customers in China to a state-

owned company. (The American firm in-

sists that“no back doorswill be created

into any of our systems” and that it will en-

sure “strong data privacy”.)

In the long run, the public’sgrowing

concerns about privacy must be at odds

with the government’s efforts to create a

new form of surveillance state. But the

Communist Party shows no sign of con-

cern: it seems to be able to have its cake and

eat it. It is tightening data-protection rules

for companies, while making it easier for it-

self to grab more private information. 7

I

N HIS bawdy rap song, “Christmas Eve”,

Wang Hao (pictured) switches from Chi-

nese to English when praising his friends

as “motherfucking dope”. Mr Wang’s fans

clearly think he is dope, too. In September

the musician (who usesthe stage name PG

One) was named as the joint winner of

“Rap of China”, a hip-hop-themed talent

show on iQiyi, a popular video-streaming

site. During its 12-episode run the contest

racked up a whopping 2.7bn views, turning

its contestants into household names.

This year, however, those revelling in

their newfound fame are under fire. In De-

cember Mr Wang was accused of having an

affair with a married actress; in an ensuing

online furore, the Communist Youth

League tweeted an attack on “Christmas

Eve”, a three-year-old track that web users

had dug out of Mr Wang’s back catalogue

and that contained far coarser lyrics than

anything he had aired on the show, includ-

ing a reference to drug-taking. All his re-

cords have since disappeared from music-

streaming services—while they are re-

viewed and revised, he says. Mr Wang

apologised for the saltiness of his early

work. He blamed it on the influence of

“black music”.

Meanwhile fortunes are also shifting

for Mr Wang’s fellow winner, Zhou Yan,

who goes by the name ofGAI. Since find-

ing fame on the show, Mr Zhou had shown

no inclination to upset prudish censors by

returning to his gangsta-rapper roots. But

on January 19th he failed to appear in the

second episode of “Singer”, a star-studded

variety show onto which he had been

booked. Netizens speculated that televi-

sion bosses had been ordered to yank him

from the series. Shortly beforehand Chi-

na’s media regulator was reported to have

circulated guidelines informing broadcast-

ers that they should not feature hip-hop

music or give airtime to people with ques-

tionable morals, undesirable ideologies or

(gasp) visible tattoos.

Rap music is not new to China. Its popu-

larity has grown in fits and starts since the

1990s. In 2014 the country’s leader, Xi Jin-

ping, said there was a place in China for im-

ported art forms such as rap as long as they

conveyed “healthy and upbeat” messages.

In recent years rap-style delivery has even

been adopted bythe partyin its propagan-

da videos. “Extensive consultation, joint

contribution and shared benefits” was a

catchy line in a partially rapped ditty re-

leased last year in praise of China’s plans

for state-led investment abroad, the Belt

and Road Initiative.

Chinese rappers tend to avoid broach-

ing sensitive political topics. Yetthe au-

thorities are clearly wary of the genre. Offi-

cials in Beijing are keen to promote

Mandarin; they are not big fans of the local

dialects that many rappers use. They also

worry about the lewdness of some rap lyr-

ics—a pretext that was used for blacklisting

120 rap songs in 2015 (when members of

one well-known group were slung into jail

for several days, apparently for being too

risqué). Despite his approval of sanitised

cultural imports, Mr Xi is far keener on tra-

ditional Chinese arts. Foreign pop idols are

finding it harder to get permission to per-

form in China. Justin Bieber and Katy Perry

are among the most famous to have been

barred in recent months.

But the party’s puritanism is at odds

with the tastes of young Chinese. It is also a

headache for television producers. The cre-

ators of “Rap of China” had promised a

second series. Ifofficials persist in keeping

colourful characters off-camera, making a

triumphant return will be hard. 7

Music

Rappers’ knuckles

rapped

BEIJING

A genre’s popularity worries officials

Hip-hop star calls music “black”
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