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Google denies working on touchscreen tech for Chinese fighter jets
Google denied that it helped China's military build a new touchscreen tool for its J-20 fighter jets.
The tech giant said that it had no role in the military aspect of touchscreen research that could potentially give an advantage to Chinese fighter jets in both air-to-air and air-to-ground combat, according to a report by the South China Morning Post.
A research paper seen by the Morning Post suggested that a lead scientist from Google actively participated in Beijing's program on the new touchscreen tools. Shumin Zai, a member of Google's A.I. team, worked on a research paper that could be used for touchscreen applications ranging from military uses to education and medicine.
"This paper addresses a very general research question in user experience design of how people interact with moving items on a touchscreen," a Google spokesperson told the Morning Post on Thursday. "This paper is simply not about military applications."
Also at Wccftech.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Friday July 12 2019, @12:31AM (1 child)
I see it slightly differently. China tends to take a (very) long-term strategic role rather than the "gimme the latest, shiniest toys whatever the cost, as long as it's better than what $other_service has" that the US military takes. I see the J-series as a thousand-to-one economic force multiplier. China builds a handful of each type for a few hundred million and sits back and watches as the US puts a trillion dollars it can't really afford to spend into just the F-35 alone, and even more into other programs. In the meantime China is busy taking over large chunks of Asia and Africa via financial means like debt traps, all without a shot being fired.
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Friday July 12 2019, @01:16PM
It's too aggressive. China and India have a lot of good growth and can look forward to a few more decades too so as long as their upper-classes can't get tax cuts that would leave them with spare capital for foreign investments beyond tech transfers, I doubt they'll bother aiming at their neighbors.
Japan and South Korea are better candidates for those sorts of polices. Unemployment, inequality and lack of growth... Those are the usual "lets export our problems" triggers.
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