How Oracle Sells Repression in China

In its bid for TikTok, Oracle was supposed to prevent data from being passed to Chinese police. Instead, it's been marketing its own software for their surveillance work. From a report: Police in China's Liaoning province were sitting on mounds of data collected through invasive means: financial records, travel information, vehicle registrations, social media, and surveillance camera footage. To make sense of it all, they needed sophisticated analytic software. Enter American business computing giant Oracle, whose products could find relevant data in the police department's disparate feeds and merge it with information from ongoing investigations. So explained a China-based Oracle engineer at a developer conference at the company's California headquarters in 2018. Slides from the presentation, hosted on Oracle's website, begin with a "case outline" listing four Oracle "product[s] used" by Liaoning police to "do criminal analysis and prediction." One slide shows Oracle software enabling Liaoning police to create network graphs based on hotel registrations and track down anyone who might be linked to a given suspect.

Another shows the software being used to build a police dashboard and create "security case heat map[s]." Apparent pictures of the software interface show a blurred face and various Chinese names. The concluding slide states that the software helped police, whose datasets had been "incomprehensible," more easily "trace the key people/objects/events" and "identify potential suspect[s]" -- which in China often means dissidents. Oracle representatives have marketed the company's data analytics for use by police and security industry contractors across China, according to dozens of company documents hosted on its website. In at least two cases, the documents imply that provincial departments used the software in their operations. One is the slideshow story about Liaoning province. The other is an Oracle document describing police in Shanxi province as a "client" in need of an intelligence platform. Oracle also boasted that its data security services were used by other Chinese police entities, according to the documents -- including police in Xinjiang, the site of a genocide against Muslim Uyghurs and other ethnic groups. In marketing materials, Oracle said that its software could help police leverage information from online comments, investigation records, hotel registrations, license plate information, DNA databases, and images for facial recognition. Oracle presentations even suggested that police could use its products to combine social media activity with dedicated Chinese government databases tracking drug users and people in the entertainment industry, a group that includes sex workers. Oracle employees also promoted company technology for China's "Police Cloud," a big data platform implemented as part of the emerging surveillance state.

If you expect morals from for-profit organizations

[BAReFO0t]

...you're gonna have a bad time!

Re:

[fustakrakich]

Really, business is business

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Ah I see. So you voluntarily installed cameras and microphones, all connected to the internet, in and around your house, and gave your local LEOs an invitation to directly monitor all of them without limit to 'keep you safe'? You're one of those people?
We have a word for companies like Oracle: 'collaborators'. Enabling evil acts makes you an accessory to evil acts.
Seriously you China shills need to be rooted out and banned from commenting in places like this. You cannot honestly defend the sorts of human

Re: If you expect morals from for-profit organiza

[IdanceNmyCar]

Didn't say they were doing nothing. They aren't doing anything we haven't ourselves done before. From the trail of tears to the Red Scare, this is all already been done by America.

Anyone with any emotional intelligence would see through your fear mongering which is exactly what this article is because it in no way discusses a potential solution. instead you try to destroy civil discussion because I as an American enjoy my life more in China. Also, it's illegal in China for employers to record voice in a w

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Shove your 'whataboutism' up your ass, and now you DEFINITELY sound like a foreign national being a China shill on the internet.

Re: If you expect morals from for-profit organizat

[drinkypoo]

What you have just written is an excellent indictment of corporatism. They are doing what they are expected to do as a public corporation, and that is to say they are doing evil for profit.

Re:

[Arthur, KBE]

Corporations are not humans

In the US they are.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

This statement is mildly misleading. There is the institution of the corporate personhood which should amended and the corporations should be stripped of the political rights. However, this institution is roughly the same in the whole western world.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

No, they are not. They have some of the rights of humans but none of the responsibilities.

Re:

[cusco]

"Corporations are people, my friend!" - Mitt Romney.

Re:

[cusco]

Indeed, and he was the ideal Republican presidential candidate, embodying all the weirdness that they support.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

I am your plain vanilla computer geek, with libertarian leanings. I am not too fond of GOP, especially after they more than doubled the public debt during the Trump presidency.

Re: If you expect morals from for-profit organiza

[drinkypoo]

The profit is not the evil part.

What they are doing for profit is.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

So why mention profit at all? What were Mao and Stalin doing in the name of the "worker class"? Scare quotes are necessary because so called "worker class" is a Marxist invention which has been refuted while Marx was still alive. Does that make the "worker class", whoever that might be, evil? As I've said, the corporations are not people and are not subject to the laws of morality. You may judge them as evil but they maybe necessary. If Oracle didn't supply those databases to Chines, do you think Microsoft

Re:

[sjames]

You seem to be reframing. Drinkypoo did NOT claim that profit is evil. He said that Oracle is doing evil for profit. There exist other things they could do for profit that are not evil.

As for the rest, no. I don't find it at all problematic to demand ethical and moral behavior from people we do business with. No good will come from allowing sociopaths (even law abiding ones) to run commerce and government.

Also note that there is a difference between accepting money from an ethically questionable entity to h

Re:

[cusco]

Really, if you want to obstruct China's data collection and analysis I would have trouble thinking of a more efficient way to do so than letting Oracle totally mangle the data. I'd speculate that could be the reason for allowing Oracle to sell its services to China, but I'm not sure anyone in Foggy Bottom or Langley is that bright.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Ah, I see. So by your logic if, say, a U.S. gun manufacturer is selling boatloads of guns to a country that they're not prohibitied by the U.S. government to sell guns to, but that the gun manufacturer knows the government of that country is oppressive and will use their guns to subjugate and/or kill unarmed civilians, it's perfectly okay because it's 'just business'? If so then I consider your reasoning to be toxic. As we all can clearly see, software can be a weapon as much as guns are.

Re:

[Arthur, KBE]

Corporations are not people.

In the US, they are.

Re:

[alvinrod]

That's a gross oversimplification and you know it. Go ahead and try to marry a corporation and see how far you get. The law merely recognizes that corporations as a legal entity have some of the same rights that people possess as individuals.

Re:

[sjames]

Corporations are run by people. Those people have ethical obligations. If corporate personhood as recognized in the U.S. legal system is valid, then it is also valid to extend those ethical obligations to corporations.

Other way around, if the personal ethical obligations of the people running corporations do not extend to the corporation itself, then neither do any of their rights and freedoms. That is, corporations have no speech at all, cannot own anything, cannot exist basically.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Corporations SHOULD operate with ethics and a moral compass, THAT IS WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD!

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[Krishnoid]

That's pretty much the case [youtu.be] when it comes to guns. Software and other less fungible product, maybe not so much.

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[omnichad]

Lots of unethical things are legal. You don't actually have to set your bar that low.

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[K. S. Kyosuke]

They know that IBM/Dehomag got richer doing the same thing and told themselves "if *they* got away with this, why can't we, too?"

Re: If you expect morals from for-profit organizat

[klipclop]

IBM sold technology to the N@zis leading to WWII. It was tech to help track all of the Jews they were interning. So these for profit tech companies will happily participate in human suffering and crime if there's a dollar in it. Wow... I broke Slashdot lameness filter....

Re:

[MrL0G1C]

Seems like half the people commenting on this topic would be perfectly fine with that because what'dya expect they're a corporation and business is business. These guys are actually worse than politicians.

Re:

[K. S. Kyosuke]

It's almost as if you were brain washed.

Pot, meet kettle.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

Corporations are the most efficient form of organization in human history. They have a purpose and a mission: to make money for the shareholders. They are governed by laws, not by morality. You can't abolish corporations and capitalism because that would cause an economic disaster like the one in the ex-SSSR. Corporations in SSSR weren't for profit. Have you ever tried a Russian car, like Lada Riva 1500? I have and I do prefer for profit cars like GM, VW, Toyota, Ford, BMW or Honda. You see, to make the "ev

Re:

[garyisabusyguy]

I would suggest that you look at the original customer for Larry Ellison and why the database is called Oracle

Typical

[Anonymous Coward]

Oracle would sell it's own children if it turned a profit.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Fuck you, asshole.
You're just another flavor of paid China shill aren't you? Your tactical plan: convince the Americans that they're not fundamentally different than China.
Eat shit and die, that's complete and total bullshit.

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

In most cases, the United States is fundamentally different from China. That being said, you should not be surprised to know that there are plenty of people in the United States that would like to change that fact.

The first thing I thought of when I saw Oracle hawking their analytics software to the CCP was: "hmm I'll bet law enforcement agencies in the US getting Amazon Ring data would love this crap". Then I realized that they're probably already buying similar software.

Overall I'd say it's more importa

Don't feel bad if you were funding this

[GameboyRMH]

Paying for and using Oracle software is its own punishment.

Not only in China

[Laxator2]

Agreed that using Oracle's software is its own form of repression.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

I am using Oracle database for the last few weeks, since the version 5.1.22 on VAX/VMS, and it seems pretty good to me. I am all open to comparisons with other databases, like MySQL (also an Oracle Corp. product) and PostgreSQL. BTW, Microsoft is also merrily selling SQL Server to Chinese. IBM is doing the same thing with DB2. Chinese government is also free to download PostgreSQL and Python and use it for their evil purposes. Is Guido van Rossum evil because he hasn't prevented the evil Chinese from using

Re:

[dewmeister]

You got that right! We use it every day, what a complete PITA!

What did we expact?

[poor_boi]

Larry needs another boat. China's got that big boat money. It's a match made in heaven.

Re:

[cusco]

What, is he bored flying his MIG around his private island in Hawaii already?

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[AlexHilbertRyan]

I wonder how many catholic priests use that defence in court ?

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[ghoul]

The US market for creepy software has been tied up by Palantir. Oracle failed to sell to the CIA so they have to look for new markets. Maybe the govt should mandate that the CIA give a certain amount of business to Oracle in exchange for not selling to China.

Not related to tiktok

[magarity]

In its bid for TikTok, Oracle was supposed to prevent data from being passed to Chinese police. Instead, it's been marketing its own software for their surveillance work

But this is not "instead". TikTok data has nothing to do with what this article is about. Please change "Instead" to "Meanwhile" or "At the same time" or similar.

Re: Not related to tiktok

[IdanceNmyCar]

The article is pure shit. Prejudice and spin with virtually nothing meaningful. It reads like someone trying to slander a competitors as.

Re: Not related to tiktok

[IdanceNmyCar]

ad

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

That's woke leftist media.

The hard choice:

[Tablizer]

Commies want CommieWare and somebody will end up providing it. So the question is, should we allow US firms to bid on such, or ban them from selling it, leaving the market to foreign firms?

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

There are plenty of conservatives that would have (and did) restrict American businesses from doing business with the USSR during the Cold War.

Re: The hard choice:

[IdanceNmyCar]

Bingo. The question the authors should of posed and discussed. Instead, the whole piece reads like a SJW rant with basically everything being said bitterly obvious for anyone who understands "business ethics" or the lack thereof

Re:

[Tailhook]

So the question is, should we allow US firms to bid on such, or ban them

Clinton (Mr.) gave China MFN status in the 90's and hell will freeze over before Biden Inc. takes it away, so you're question is moot. US companies will continue selling themselves out to China for the foreseeable future.

Enjoy. You voted for it. Many times over many decades.

Re:

[Tablizer]

It appears you didn't address the question. What should US policy be for such? It's clear you don't like the current policy, but it's good practice to have an alternative prepared before griping. Work 101.

Re:

[Tailhook]

have an alternative

There is no alternative; our Western establishment is bought and paid for by China. Nothing that happens during the remainder of your lifetime will run counter to Chinese prerogatives. They're conducting the official whitewash of COVID-19 on behalf of China as we 'speak.' No one is going to trouble China or Oracle about how they use software from US companies.

Re:

[Tailhook]

Are you people

On one hand I have chuckleheads like you, on the other I have reality, where our newly elected Chinese puppet is handwaving human rights violations in Xinjiang and Hong Kong and saber rattling over Taiwan as 'different cultural norms.'

I'm going with reality. You can go screw.

Re:

[Tablizer]

I'm going with reality.

From which planet?

Great Business Plan Oracle!

[Buffalo Al]

Selling the Chinese your software makes much better business sense that having them infringe on your intellectual property. I applaud Larry for his salesmanship!

Re:

[doesnothingwell]

Selling the Chinese your software makes much better business sense that having them infringe on your intellectual property. I applaud Larry for his salesmanship!

Works great until China invents a "look a like" system that doesn't infringe Oracles patents. cough cough They will won't pay Larry's license fees for long.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

They'll just pirate it, it's not like they don't have 100,000,000 hackers in-country.

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[Rick Schumann]

'Sell'? They'll just crack whatever licensing scheme is used to control copies of it, then copy it as many times as they want and not pay for it.

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[cusco]

Then they'll figure out what a clusterfuck of a system they've just stolen and dump it as the useless pile of outdated garbage that it is.

I've been involved in a number of fairly large database projects over the years, two of them were Oracle and both were multi-year multi-million dollar fiascos. One was replaced by Informix and the other by SQL Server.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

Go ask the Uighurs about that.
(Yes I know you're being sarcastic, I'm being sarcastic right back)

Re: Wait... Repression in China??

[dwater]

I've been there to xinjiang, and interacted with them, visited their many mosques and seen them praying etc.
Does your experience of them there, living their lives seemingly quite happily, differ from mine?

Re:

[cusco]

They're still better than our wonderful allies Saudi Arabia or Israel.

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

. . . no, they aren't. And in Saudi Arabia's case, that's saying something.

Paradox of progress

[iamacat]

Criminals will use any tech available to them, including dark web, end to end encryption, ransomware, deepfakes, armed drones, even nukes/dirty bombs if they can get a hold of these. In general, we want police to win over criminals. Even in oppressive countries like China there are lots of common criminals and would be terrorists that we don't want to operate with impunity. And trying to keep tech out of hands of criminals doesn't work and hurts law abiding citizens and businesses that need same technology for benign reasons.

So I don't see any way out of also giving police access to cutting edge tech - mining of publicly available and voluntarily provided data, surveillance and armed drones, jetpacks - to even out the odds. It's spooky and dangerous, but criminals are spooky and dangerous too.

Maybe humankind can only survive through space exploration because we are too stupid and irresponsible to all be around each other. We can't resist developing dangerous stuff just because we can, or using it for crimes, or abusing authority to stop crimes.

Re:

[Rick Schumann]

It comes down to trust: We can't trust the Chinese government and Chinese LEOs. Would you hand a gun to someone you know you can't trust to not go around shooting up everything and everyone?

Re: Paradox of progress

[dwater]

Why do you have trouble trusting the Chinese?

Re:

[jjbenz]

Why don't you have trouble trusting the Chinese government?

Re:

[ghoul]

We trust American cops with guns. How much worse can Chinese cops be?

Re:

[iamacat]

Do you have a surge of trust towards Chinese mafia? Maybe a version of MAD is the only thing that will keep both honest-ish?

Re:

[Bongo]

I think that is a sound argument.

A problem is that if the government ends up having overwhelming power, then the smartest criminals will need to take over the government.

In other words, if you don't want nasty dictators to get into power, don't give the government the kinds of powers which nasty dictators crave.

And by nasty dictators I mean like those german guys which Indiana Jobes hates (Slashdot filter seems to not like their name).

Knowing Oracle ...

[fahrbot-bot]

How Oracle Sells Repression in China

... it's probably a line-item on their order forms -- priced per person.

Re:

[Black-Adder-61]

You have apparently never worked for Oracle Corp. Oracle Corp. has always been VERY concerned with following all the applicable laws. In this case, there are none. BTW, did you know that the president's son got much richer by doing business with CCP? I wonder what did he sell?

Re:

[DrMrLordX]

He sold influence.

Other countries

[NotEmmanuelGoldstein]

... a big data platform implemented as part of the emerging surveillance state.

Anyone remember Total Information Awareness: The USA plan to have police inspect everything online and be able to track a person's every breath? China's "police cloud" isn't different to what other countries are doing: For example, the US 'no fly' list. China is just labelling more people as "potential suspect[s]".

... four Oracle "product[s] used" ...

One can be very confident that Oracle sold this to the US government first.

Re:

[AlexHilbertRyan]

One can be confident the uS military funded oracle in the 80s, which it did.

Re: Other countries

[dwater]

> China is just labelling more people as "potential suspect[s]".

That's quite an assumption.

American military

[AlexHilbertRyan]

Yet another example of the american military financing another arsehole (Ellision) who will do anything for a dollar, human rights or not.

Oracle's name change to ...

[MxMatrix]

... horracle.

Is Capitalism bad for the communists?

[billd10]

A capitalist company helping communist dictators repress their people to get rich. Who said capitalism and communism can't work together?