Chinese tech: companies forced to share their algorithms

The Alibaba logo, seen on a building in Beijing on November 16, 2021. AP - Ng Han Guan

Text by: Zhifan Liu Follow

3 mins

New blow for Chinese digital giants, including Tencent, Alibaba and ByteDance, which have given authorities details about their algorithms.

An unprecedented approach in an increasingly tense context for players in the sector.

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It is a new turn of the screw imposed by the communist regime to counter the tech giants.

Regulators have released information about the algorithms of several apps, used daily by hundreds of millions of Chinese.

These tools make it possible to make automatic recommendations to a user based on their habits or preferences.

Alibaba, the leader in online commerce, for example, offers new products based on the user's browsing history.

For its part, Douyin, the Chinese equivalent of TikTok, recommends a video to a user based on those he has previously viewed on the application.

Frame the algorithms

Since a law enacted in March, the Alibabas, Tencent and other ByteDance, which have enormous amounts of personal data on their users, have handed over to the Chinese authorities the details of their algorithms, a secret recipe for attracting new Internet users and making them stay. on their application.

Worried about the opacity of the digital giants vis-à-vis these practices, the authorities are seeking to further regulate the algorithms.

This decision by the Chinese regulator is yet another measure aimed at controlling more closely the activity of these groups with their growing influence in Chinese society.

As a sign of this distrust of the digital sector, several behemoths have been singled out in recent months, particularly in terms of personal data, competition and user rights.

Retaliatory measures

In recent years, these tech giants have developed in a number of sectors, including those previously reserved for the central authorities in Beijing.

Alibaba and Tencent – ​​leaders in mobile payment, which have become ubiquitous in China – have notably entered the banking sector, the preserve of Chinese public institutions.

For its part, the communist regime observes with suspicion this rise of tech and multiplies the retaliatory measures.

In 2018, Chinese regulators suspended the IPO of Ant Group, a financial subsidiary of Alibaba, at the last moment.

A few weeks before the blocking of this record introduction, Jack Ma, CEO of the group, had ventured to criticize the rigidity of financial regulators.

A crime of lèse-majesté in Xi Jinping's China, which also earned a record fine of 2.3 billion euros for the e-commerce champion, for obstructing competition.

As a direct consequence, the very eccentric Chinese billionaire was walled in silence for many months.

"Common Prosperity"

In the process, the Chinese president revived the concept of common prosperity, an ideal of redistribution of wealth inherited from the Maoist era.

The very rich are asked to participate in this ideal which is found everywhere in the propaganda of the regime.

The digital giants hastened to multiply donations to “ 

 ”.

Even Jack Ma came out of the woodwork to assert that “ 

 ” was the “ 

 ” of the country's entrepreneurs.

Aware that they no longer had the wind in their sails, many Chinese tech executives resigned, such as Zhang Yiming, the CEO and founder of ByteDance, owner of TikTok.

The 9th Chinese fortune said in its departure press release that it wanted to indulge in its favorite pastimes and to “ 

 ”.

Far from the digital sector and reprisals from the Chinese authorities.

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