China has developed a vast ranking system that will monitor the behaviour of its huge population
KARACHI: China has developed a vast ranking system that will monitor the behaviour of its huge population, and rank them all, based on their “social credit”. The “social credit system”, first announced in 2014, aims to reinforce the idea of “keeping trust is glorious and breaking trust is disgraceful”. According to an official document, the exact methodology of the system is a secret though, examples of infractions include unsafe driving, smoking in non-smoking zones, buying too many video games, and posting fake news online.
Being publicly named as a ‘bad person’ can have serious consequences like preventing adults from obtaining the best jobs because of negative ranking and credits. Whereas being publicly named as ‘good person’ can have benefits such as getting discounts on energy bills, being able to rent things without deposits, and getting better interest rates at banks.
Muhammed Kashif Saeed
Published in The Express Tribune, July 15th, 2018.
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