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posted by mrpg on Tuesday March 20 2018, @03:03AM   Printer-friendly
from the blockchain-based? dept.

China said it will begin applying its so-called social credit system to flights and trains and stop people who have committed misdeeds from taking such transport for up to a year.

People who would be put on the restricted lists included those found to have committed acts like spreading false information about terrorism and causing trouble on flights, as well as those who used expired tickets or smoked on trains, according to two statements issued on the National Development and Reform Commission’s website on Friday.

[...] China has flagged plans to roll out a system that will allow government bodies to share information on its citizens’ trustworthiness and issue penalties based on a so-called social credit score.

China to bar people with bad 'social credit' from planes, trains

INSIDE CHINA'S VAST NEW EXPERIMENT IN SOCIAL RANKING

China’s dystopian social credit system is a harbinger of the global age of the algorithm


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Grishnakh on Tuesday March 20 2018, @04:53PM (3 children)

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Tuesday March 20 2018, @04:53PM (#655477)

    Yeah, this makes me wonder about my political orientation. I normally consider myself fairly liberal, but I actually kinda like the idea of this thing: keeping trouble-makers and smokers off of planes and trains seems like a good idea to me! Honestly, I'm not sure I see the problem here, and I can imagine how a similar system would be done here in the "land of the free" US: it'd be done as a voluntary database shared by companies, rather than top-down by the government, but the effect would be mostly the same. If you're a shitty passenger on a plane who abuses flight attendants or has a kid who kicks other peoples' seats or smokes in the lavatory, airlines should be free to put your name in a database, and refuse to sell any more tickets to you (private businesses almost always have the right to refuse service to people, especially when they've had trouble with that customer before). And there's no law I'm aware of that prevents them from sharing that information with their competitors, so that a bad customer doesn't cause an incident with them too. Honestly, I'm not sure why the airlines haven't already done this. And at least if the government is running such a system, in a democratic republic you at least have the power, in theory, to get your elected leaders to change the law if it's bad and amend it so, for instance, someone can get their name off the list after a long enough time, or taking classes on how to behave on planes, or whatever, whereas with something privately-run it's up to the whims of the companies that own it.

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  • (Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday March 20 2018, @06:12PM (2 children)

    by Freeman (732) on Tuesday March 20 2018, @06:12PM (#655530) Journal

    Please note China's poverty: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/Countries_by_poverty_rate_world_bank_data.png [wikimedia.org] This is a way for them to keep the dirty masses away from the well to do.

    Keeping "trouble-makers" off planes and trains sounds "good", but who defines "trouble-maker"? There's no real "smoking" issue in the USA anymore. Unless you're talking about finding a restaurant that allows someone to smoke. Personally, I would call it an invasion of privacy and would be too easily abused to have such a database of "trouble-makers". I can see being tempted to create a list of the disruptive people, but actually doing that on a National scale would be a step towards a dystopian future.

    I'm over 9000% more likely to support a push for legal recreational drugs than any National database (public / private) that companies / government could use to track you even more. Private companies have the right to refuse service and block you from using them in the future. Locking a person out of public transportation and / or other things for one bad day would be really messed up. I'm also guessing pretty much every convicted felon would get on this list as well. Even for a person who is regularly a pain to deal with, it's not a path we should go down.

    --
    Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Tuesday March 20 2018, @06:55PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Tuesday March 20 2018, @06:55PM (#655562)

      Keeping "trouble-makers" off planes and trains sounds "good", but who defines "trouble-maker"?

      Well, for airplanes, I'd say whenever there's incidents where people scream at flight attendants, get drunk and disorderly, kids kick peoples' seats, people get into fights, etc., that these constitute "trouble-makers". Do you disagree?

      There's no real "smoking" issue in the USA anymore.

      Yes, there is. It's not *that* common, but people still do sneak cigarettes into the lavatories in airplanes and smoke there, even though it's against federal law. I don't see why anyone caught doing this should ever be allowed to fly again. Felons are commonly punished in strong ways, by removing many of their rights, and this is no different.

      Personally, I would call it an invasion of privacy and would be too easily abused to have such a database of "trouble-makers".

      How is it an "invasion of privacy" to have a database of criminals? You do realize that it's criminal behavior to smoke on an airplane, don't you? And that it's criminal behavior to disobey flight attendants? Are you saying that criminals should have some expectation of privacy, and that their criminal records should be kept secret, especially when their crimes jeopardize safety in-flight? You really think airlines shouldn't be able to refuse service to these people?

      I'm also guessing pretty much every convicted felon would get on this list as well. Even for a person who is regularly a pain to deal with, it's not a path we should go down.

      So people who have *proven* themselves to be a real problem and danger in a thin aluminum cylinder hurtling through the air at close to the speed of sound should somehow be allowed to continue to be a disruption?

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Tuesday March 20 2018, @07:01PM

      by tangomargarine (667) on Tuesday March 20 2018, @07:01PM (#655568)

      Keeping "trouble-makers" off planes and trains sounds "good", but who defines "trouble-maker"?

      Very much this. You only implement government policies that are obviously authoritarian when you know you can get away with it (the population is too stupid to notice, or lacks the ability to do anything about it). Until that point is reached, you implement things that seem innocuous enough on their face, then slowly turn up the heat by bending them to your original purpose.

      The U.S. isn't quite to that point yet because avoiding massive protests still seems to be a thing people slightly care about.

      --
      "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"