印度的應用禁令威脅著中國作為全球科技大國的崛起

Yahoo Finance on 30 June 2020

India’s App Ban Threatens China’s Rise as a Global Tech Power

Bloomberg Bloomberg News,Bloomberg 3 hours ago

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(Bloomberg) -- China over the past decade built an alternate online reality where Google and Facebook barely exist. Now its own largest tech corporations from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. to Tencent Holdings Ltd. are getting a taste of what a shutout feels like.

India’s unprecedented decision to ban 59 of China’s largest apps is a warning to the country’s tech giants, who for years thrived behind a government-imposed Great Firewall that kept out many of America’s best-known internet names. If India finds a way to carry out that threat, it may present a model for other countries from Europe to Southeast Asia that seek to curtail the pervasiveness of apps like ByteDance Ltd.’s TikTok while safeguarding their citizens’ enormously valuable data.

The surprise moratorium hit Chinese internet companies just as they were beginning to make headway in the world’s fastest-growing mobile arena, en route to going global and challenging American tech industry supremacy. TikTok had signed up 200 million users there, Xiaomi Corp. is the No. 1 smartphone brand, and Alibaba and Tencent have aggressively pushed their services.

But India’s policy jeopardizes all those successes, and could have wider geopolitical consequences as the U.S. seeks to rally countries to stop using Huawei Technologies Co. for 5G networks. With China’s tech companies poised to become some of the most dominant in emerging industries like artificial intelligence, India’s actions may spur countries around the world to weigh the extent to which they let China gain user data -- and potentially economic leverage in future disputes.

“Techno-nationalism will manifest itself increasingly across all aspects of geopolitics: national security, economic competitiveness, even social values,” said Alex Capri, a Singapore-based research fellow at the Hinrich Foundation. “It will be increasingly difficult to separate Chinese tech firms from the CCP and China’s geopolitical ambitions. They will find themselves increasingly locked out.”

 Chinese internet firms have struggled to replicate their online services beyond their home turf, even before Washington lawmakers began raising concerns about the wisdom of allowing the Asian country’s corporations -- like ByteDance -- to hoover up valuable personal data. India amplified those concerns by accusing apps including TikTok, Tencent’s WeChat, Alibaba’s UC Web and Baidu Inc.’s map and translation services of threatening its sovereignty and security.

India’s prohibition provides further evidence that nations are using tech for to assert themselves geopolitically, following the Trump administration’s worldwide campaign to contain China and national champions like Huawei. That depends in part on how much Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s actions are motivated by domestic interests following the worst military clash between India and China in almost half a century.

“Beijing should certainly worry that the impact of the deadly clash could push India toward the U.S.,” said Zhang Baohui, director of the Centre for Asian Pacific Studies at Lingnan University. “But these recent economic measures by India may not by themselves concern Beijing too much as it understands that Modi’s government, facing rising domestic nationalism, has to do something to soothe the public sentiments and retain legitimacy.”

 China-India Tensions Continue Despite Pledge to Disengage

It remains unclear how India will enforce its decision, given TikTok -- for one -- has already been downloaded by roughly one in six people. But it follows a series of steps to curb China’s presence in the country, demonstrating the administration’s hardened resolve since long-simmering tensions boiled over after a deadly Himalayan border clash that killed 20 Indian soldiers.

The country’s government procurement website has barred purchases of Chinese-made goods. Authorities have asked the largest e-commerce companies, including Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc.’s Flipkart, to start showing “country of origin” on goods sold. And India is said to be dragging its heels on clearing goods imported from China, stranding electronics at ports.

“The Indian government thinks about governing the internet in a very similar way to China, which is blanket bans, asserting national boundaries on the internet and essentially carving out what would eventually become a version of the Indian Great Firewall,” said Dev Lewis, a research fellow at Digital Asia Hub in Shanghai. “Everyone’s struggling to deal with governing technology companies and apps, especially ones that cross borders. So when India takes a step like this, it sets a precedent for the things that you can do.”

In terms of the immediate business consequences, ByteDance could be hardest-hit. India is its biggest market with more than 200 million TikTok users. During a brief ban last year, the Chinese company estimated it was missing out on half a million dollars a day of revenue. In a statement posted to Twitter, TikTok India head Nikhil Gandhi said the company complies with all data privacy and security requirements under Indian law and has not shared any user information with any foreign government, including Beijing.

India’s prohibition could also give American companies a possible edge over Chinese players in a rare global tech market that is both populous and not yet saturated. While WeChat never made it big in India, banning it may help shore up Facebook Inc.’s WhatsApp. Cutting out TikTok immediately gives Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube a boost.

On Tuesday, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian said China was “strongly concerned” about India’s actions. “The Indian government has a responsibility to uphold the legitimate and legal rights of the international investors including Chinese ones,” he said.

In India, TikTok Takes On YouTube in a Nasty Fight for Dominance

But for now, China doesn’t have many great options to retaliate.

“While Beijing is highly adept at economic coercion, in this case it has somewhat limited options to act in a reciprocal manner,” analysts for the Eurasia Group wrote in a research note. “Bilateral trade is heavily weighted toward Chinese exports to India. Attempts to hurt India economically could blowback on Chinese companies.”

Translation

（彭博社）-中國過去十年來，在Google和Facebook幾乎不存在的情況下, 建立了另一種在線現實。現在, 從阿里巴巴集團控股有限公司（Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.）到騰訊控股有限公司（Tencent Holdings Ltd.），中國自己最大的科技公司現在已經感受到了被關閉的感覺。

印度史無前例的決定禁止中國59種最大的應用程序，對在該國的科技巨頭發出了警告。多年來，印度政府大力推行的防火牆技術, 使美國許多最知名的互聯網名稱都被拒之門外。如果印度找到施行這種威脅的方法，那麼它可能會為由歐洲到東南亞的其他國家/地區提供一個典範，去減少ByteDance Ltd. 的TikTok等應用程序的氾濫，同時保護其公民的寶貴數據。

中國互聯網公司開始在全球增長最快的流動無線領域取得進展，在邁向全球化並挑戰美國科技行業霸主地位之際，這一突如其來的暫停令打擊中國互聯網公司。 TikTok在那裡簽約了2億用戶，小米公司是第一大智能手機品牌，阿里巴巴和騰訊都在積極推展其服務。

但是印度的政策危及所有這些成功，並且可能會產生更廣泛的地緣政治後果，因為美國試圖召集各國停止使用華為技術有限公司的5G網絡。隨著中國的科技公司準備成為人工智能等新興產業中最主要的力量，印度的舉動可能會刺激世界各國權衡他們讓中國獲取用戶數據的程度,以及潛在的經濟槓桿作用。

辛里奇基金會駐新加坡研究員亞歷克斯·卡普里（Alex Capri）說:“技術民族主義將越來越多地體現在地緣政治的各個方面：國家安全，經濟競爭力乃至社會價值”, “將中國科技公司與中共和中國的地緣政治野心分開將越來越困難。他們將發現自己越來越被封鎖。”

中國的互聯網公司一直在努力在自己的地盤之外複製其在線服務，甚至先於華盛頓立法者開始對允許亞洲國家的公司（如ByteDance）盤旋在寶貴的個人數據上的智慧表示擔憂。印度通過指責TikTok，騰訊的微信，阿里巴巴的UC Web和百度的地圖和翻譯服務等應用程序正在威脅其主權和安全，加大了這些擔憂。

印度的禁令提供了進一步的證據，表明各國正在利用科技來推動它們的地緣政治, 並跟隨特朗普政府在全球範圍內遏制中國和像華為這樣的國家擁護者。在印度和中國之間發生近半個世紀以來最嚴重的軍事衝突之後，在某種程度上，這取決於納倫德拉·莫迪總理的舉動有多少是出於内政利益的計算。

嶺南大學亞太研究中心主任張寶輝說：“北京當然應該擔心致命衝突的影響會把印度推向美國。” “但是印度最近採取的這些經濟措施可能並不會使北京本身過分擔心，因為它了解到，莫迪政府面對不斷上升的國內民族主義，必須採取某些措施來安撫公眾情緒並證明其存在合法性。”

儘管承諾脫離對峙，但中印緊張局勢仍在繼續

目前尚不清楚印度將如何執行其決定，因為 - TikTok它本身 - 大約已經有六分之一的人下載了。但印度採取了一系列步驟來遏制中國在該國的存在，表明政府的堅定決心，因為在致命的喜馬拉雅邊境衝突導致20名印度士兵喪生之後，長期的緊張局勢無法再受到控製。

印度政府採購網站禁止購買中國產商品。有關部門已要最大的電子商務公司,包括Amazon.com Inc.和Walmart Inc.的Flipkart在內開始顯示所售商品的“原產國”。據說印度在拖慢從中國進口貨物的海關清算，將電子產品滯留在港口。

海數字亞洲中心研究員Dev Lewis說:“印度政府考慮以與中國非常相似的方式來管理互聯網，這是一攬子禁令，在互聯網上確立國家邊界，並從根本上勾勒出最終將成為印度大防火牆的版本”， “每個人都在努力應付管理技術公司和應用程序，尤其是那些跨界的公司。因此，當印度採取這樣的步驟時，把您可以做的事情樹立出先例。”

就對直接的業務後果而言，ByteDance可能受到的打擊最大。印度是其最大的市場，擁有超過2億的TikTok用戶。在去年的一次短暫禁令中，這家中國公司估計每天損失50萬美元的收入。 TikTok印度負責人Nikhil Gandhi在發給Twitter的聲明中說，該公司符合印度法律規定的所有數據隱私和安​​全要求，並且未與包括北京在內的任何外國政府共享任何用戶信息。

印度的禁令還可能使美國公司在一個人口眾多但尚未飽和的稀有全球科技市場上，從中國企業可能取得優勢。儘管微信從未在印度取得成功，但禁止它可能有助於支撐Facebook Inc.的WhatsApp。淘汰TikTok立即為Alphabet Inc. 的YouTube帶來了提升作用。

外交部發言人趙立建週二表示，中國“強烈關注”印度的行動。他說：“印度政府有責任維護包括中國在內的國際投資者的合法權益。”

在印度, Tiktok接受來自Youtube的一場令人極噁心的主權挑戰

但是目前，中國沒有太多報復的選擇。

歐亞集團（Eurasia Group）的分析師在一份研究報告中寫道：“儘管北京非常擅長經濟脅迫，但在這種情況下，它採取回應行動的選擇有限。”, “在雙邊貿易中, 中國對印度的出口中佔很大比重。試圖在經濟上傷害印度可能會打擊中國公司。”

              So, in Asia, India becomes another country that has a boundary line issue with China, following Japan on the Senkaku Islands, the Philippines and Vietnam over the Paracel Islands. Currently China is very busy in arguing with the international community on matters related to the Covid-19. Other on-going issues for China may include the overseas Huawei 5G project and the new National Security Law in Hong Kong.