https://nypost.com/2019/05/18/chinas-new-social-credit-system-turns-orwells-1984-into-reality/

Imagine calling a friend. Only instead of hearing a ring tone you hear
a police siren, and then a voice intoning, “Be careful in your
dealings with this person.” [...]

Say you arrive at the Beijing airport, intending to catch a flight to
Canton 1,200 miles south. The clerk at the ticket counter turns you
away because — you guessed it — your social credit score is too low.

[...] you are then forced to travel by slow train. What should have
been a three-hour flight becomes a 30-hour, stop-and-go nightmare.

All because the government has declared you untrustworthy. Perhaps you
defaulted on a loan, made the mistake of criticizing some government
policy online or just spent too much time playing video games on the
internet. All of these actions, and many more, can cause your score to
plummet, forcing citizens onto the most dreaded rung on China’s
deadbeat caste system, the laolai.

[...] The government algorithm will go as far as to install an
“embarrassing” ring tone on the phones of laolai, shaming them every
time they get a call in public.

“Tapping on a person marked on the map reveals their personal
information, including their full name, court-case number and the
reason they have been labeled untrustworthy. Identity-card numbers and
home addresses are also partially shown,” ABC reported. [...]

The government claims that its purpose is to enhance trust and social
stability by creating a “culture of sincerity” that will “restore
social trust.” [...]

Individuals can earn points, for example, for reporting those who
violate the new restrictions on religious practice, such as Christians
who illegally meet to pray in private homes, or the Muslim Uyghurs and
Kazakhs in China’s far west whom they spot praying in public, fasting
during Ramadan or just growing a beard. [...]

Western criticism of the new system has been intense, with Human
Rights Watch describing it as “chilling.”

In response, Chinese Communist Party publications scoff that
Westerners are simply too unsophisticated to understand the wonders of
the new system.

In the words of China’s Global Times, “The hypothetical theories of
the West are based on their ignorance.” The massive social credit
system, it goes on to say, is simply “beyond the understanding of
Western countries.”
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