Computing and the Social Credit System

Exploring the Social Credit System in the US, China, and on 2035 Bucknell campus

What is the Social Credit System?

Recently, China’s Social Credit System (SCS) has seen a lot of coverage in the press [1, 5, 8]. Powered by advances in computing technologies able to process huge amounts of data, the Chinese government is rolling out an experimental mass surveillance program designed to monitor and rate its citizens based on their actions, supposedly picking up even the finest details in their daily lives. This has been met with much public outcry in the Western world [5, 7, 9] on the grounds of privacy infringement issues, but is China the only place with such a system, and really, what exactly is a Social Credit System?

Fig 1. The Social Credit System has been likened to George Orwell’s 1984 in the Western media due to its close monitoring of civilian life [8, 9].

In general terms, Social Credit System (SCS) is a record-keeping, pattern-recognizing system that keeps track of an individual’s location online and offline and rates people based on their behavior. In other words, it is a system that utilizes technology to survey over a group of people. [1] There can be many different takes on the system, but let us first take a look at the Chinese System as an example.

The Chinese System

Although not the first in history to come up with such a system, the Chinese government has been actively developing and experimental programs with the intention to eventually have a standardized “national reputation system” in place; the program initiated regional trials in 2009, before launching a national pilot with eight credit scoring firms in 2014 [2]. In its full-fledged form, the proposition is that the system would track and evaluate each citizen and hand out rewards or punishment based on each individual’s social credit score. The program seeks to incorporate many systems into one place. As an example of how the judicial system and the financial system is working together, in one of the pilot trials, if someone fails to pay their fines to the court, their credit score with credit card institutions could get deducted. On the other hand, if someone with a good score (which can be obtained by, for example, donating to charity), he or she would get easier access to credit loans [2]. It is worth noting that since China’s Social Credit System is still under development, many different systems are happening at the local levels, too. For example, Beijing has a rule that states playing loud music on the city’s subway system could result in social credit point deduction; such rules don’t exist for other cities without a subway system.

The American System

It turns out China is not the only part of the world with a Social Credit System in place. Many places in the world today have it in one form or another, and that also includes the United States. However, unlike the SCS that exists in China, the American SCS is a bit more elusive; it is enforced by the industries. For example, a company called PatronScan produces ID scanners for bars and other entertainment venues. [1] The scanners are connected to a database that has a list of unruly customers. [1] And the unruly customer will be blacklisted from all the venues that use PatronScan scanners — up to a year. [1] Being unruly is a social credit deduction, and the ban is the outcome of the lowered credit score. Similarly, services such as Uber and AirBnB are also examples of companies that track and assign their users’ social credit. The drivers and hosts of Uber and AirBnB can rate the experience of having you as their customer. If your ratings drop to low, you can get banned from using these services. [1] Poor behavior will deduct your social credit score, leading to a ban in traveling accommodations.

Public Opinion and Effect on Citizens

Much of the western press has been abhorred by the Chinese system, criticizing it out of concerns for privacy and its potentially negative effects on the citizens’ well-being. To quote some, The Hill [8] has stated that “[t]he totalitarian 1984 of the future is now 2018 China.”, and Mike Pence [8] has condemned it as “an Orwellian system premised on controlling virtually every facet of human life.” However, are these criticisms justified? How exactly does the Chinese system affect the civilian life, both through rewards and punishment?

As it turns out, sometimes the punishment prescribed by the Chinese system can indeed be pretty severe. As an example, those in debt could get travel banned [5] by the system, which prevents them from booking any airline or train tickets, or making any hotel accommodation at all. Having a low social credit score and getting “blacklisted” could also exclude your children from admission to better schools in the district, and sometimes that your mugshots are even displayed publicly on large LED screens on buildings, or shown before the movie in movie theaters [8].

Fig 2. Public stance on the policy is fairly divided; support mainly comes from socially advantaged Chinese citizens, while the West is largely against it out of concerns for personal privacy.

Surprisingly, most Chinese citizens seem to approve of the system. In a 2018 cross-regional internet survey [4] of 2,209 Chinese citizens of various backgrounds, the respondents had an 80% approval rate. What can be at play here? Aside from their personal philosophical beliefs, many of the respondents cite the rewards offered by the program as an incentive for their approval. For those on a good standing, in addition to easier access to credit debt as mentioned previously, there are also various other perks such as less waiting time at the hospital or at government agencies, discounts at hotels, and greater likelihood of receiving employment offers, etc. The results of the survey indicate that respondents who are more socially advantaged (with higher income and education) tend to approve of the program more, which may be able to explain the high approval rate as these people tend to be the ones receiving the benefits and not the punishment, while the outlook for the fate of those less fortunate seems less bright.

In contrast, the effects on American citizens are not as bad compared to the Chinese citizens. We do not get punished with public mugshots for being a rowdy Uber passenger. But we do receive penalties usually in forms of bans from non-essential services.[1] Also, the reward system isn’t as impactful as well. While rewards such as less waiting time at hospitals were mentioned earlier, there are no such rewards here in America.

Fig 3. Uber and AirBnB are among some Silicon Valley companies that implements some form of Social Credit System by having its users give each other ratings based on their interaction.

Case Study: Bucknell University Greek Life in 2035

We wanted to look at our immediate community, Bucknell University, for a case study. After conducting an interview with one of our classmates who is in a fraternity, we learned that the social credit system exists in greek life on campus. For example, in our classmate’s fraternity, there is a system called the “risk point system”[6] in which members get points for “[choosing] to be on risk”.[6] Risk is a person who stays sober and patrols the party making sure that people aren’t getting hurt, harassed, etc. The points earned counts towards “perks such as living in the [fraternity] house and parking spots [outside of the house]”[6].

Fig 4. On Bucknell campus, a variant of the social credit system also exists in the form of members points and perks for showing up to events in Greek Life.

However, there is no computing involved in the process. So using a time machine, we travel to 2035, where the fraternity plans to release an app that supervises the social credit system (risk point system). Here are the features of the app:

1. It keeps audio recordings of fraternity members on risk and uses AI to decipher the speech that the recording picks up. It makes sure that the person on risk is handling the job responsibly. Points will be added if the job is done well, and points will be deducted for any irresponsibility.
2. Morning after a party, certain members can sign up to clean the house for points. The app uses GPS to track members who are supposed to clean to make sure that they are actually doing the work for the points instead of sleeping in.
3. There is a website where the Bucknell student community can anonymously rate an interaction that they had with members of the fraternity. The recipient of a good rating will get a boost in their points while a recipient of a bad rating will get points deductions.
4. It has access to each member’s grades and will add/deduct points based on GPA.

The app is meant to benefit all members of the fraternity. It will give members an equal opportunity to receive perks and it will provide the fraternity leaders an easy way to fairly distribute perks to the members without complaints about unfairness. It may also do the entire Bucknell community a favor because the app encourages fraternity members on risk to be more diligent in their role. There could be a decline in students getting hurt or harassed during parties. However, there are some possible negative outcomes from implementing this system. One is that there are ways to get around the GPS system: You can simply leave your phone with someone else or wherever you need to be. There is no way for your mobile device to detect whether you are physically present or not. We can get around this by not telling the fraternity members that they are being tracked by GPS, but that would be unethical and a clear invasion of privacy.

This is where the ethical concerns of this app comes into play: How do we establish a system of surveillance without invading an individual’s privacy? GPS tracking and voice recognition is giving away our data. It allows a database to store our voices and our location. If someone were to gain access to the database, we could be in danger of identity theft, threats, and stalking. Also, there may be foul play by the members of the fraternity where a member can make threats or offer bribes to other students to give them good ratings on the online rating website. This could lead to some students being hurt and conflicts rising over money issues within the Bucknell community.

In order to ensure the safety of the public and the users of the application, strict security measures and an offline enforcement system need to be in place. The app needs to be secure enough that even the developers and the administrators of the app cannot access the GPS and voice data. Also, to avoid fraternity members from gaining unethical points, there should be boxes around campus where people can drop anonymous notes that Bucknell staff can pick up that can alert them about misuse of the app. Getting Bucknell staff involved will prevent corruption within the fraternity — the fraternity officers may be secretly allowing for these foul plays to happen.

References

1. Elgan, Mike. “Uh-Oh: Silicon Valley Is Building a Chinese-Style Social Credit System.” Fast Company. Fast Company, August 26, 2019.
2. Zhong, Yuhao (Summer 2019). “Rethinking the Social Credit System: A Long Road to Establishing Trust in Chinese Society”. Symposium on Applications of Contextual Integrity: 28–29.
3. Baron, Jessica. “Life Insurers Can Use Social Media Posts To Determine Premiums, As Long As They Don’t Discriminate.” Forbes, Forbes Magazine, 4 Feb. 2019.
4. Kostka, Genia (23 July 2018). “China’s Social Credit Systems and Public Opinion: Explaining High Levels of Approval”. Rochester, NY.
5. “How China’s ‘social credit’ system blocked millions of people from travelling”. Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 7 March 2019.
6. Galaan Abdissa. “Greek Life Social Credit System.” 31 Mar. 2020.
7. West, Jack Karsten and Darrell M. (18 June 2018). “China’s social credit system spreads to more daily transactions”. Brookings. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
8. Devereaux, Abigail, and Linan Peng. “Give Us a Little Social Credit: To Design or to Discover Personal Ratings in the Era of Big Data.” Journal of Institutional Economics: 1–19. Print.
9. Wong, Karen Li Xan, and Amy Shields Dobson. “We’Re Just Data: Exploring China’s Social Credit System in Relation to Digital Platform Ratings Cultures in Westernised Democracies.” Global Media and China, vol. 4, no. 2, 18 June 2019, pp. 220–232., doi:10.1177/2059436419856090.