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Speaker 1: I'm newt Gingrich. Please watch Journey to America, my new

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Speaker 1: documentary in PBS about nine remarkable individuals who strengthen our

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Speaker 1: country through their pursuit of the American dream. From Albert

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Speaker 1: Einstein to Hetty Lamar to Zelma Calilazade. We explore how

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Speaker 1: individual stories help shape our national identity. Watch Journey to

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Speaker 1: America premier on Tuesday, January fourteenth to ten pm Eastern,

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Speaker 1: nine pm Central on PBS and the PBS app. On

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Speaker 1: this episode of Newts World. On December eighth, twenty twenty four,

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Speaker 1: the US Treasury Department was notified by a third party

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Speaker 1: software provider, Beyond Trust, that a hacker had gained access

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Speaker 1: to a security key which allowed the intruder to override

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Speaker 1: certain security protocols and access some Treasury Department office workstations

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Speaker 1: and unclassified documents stored on them, according to the letter

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Speaker 1: notifying the Senate Banking Committee of the breach. On Friday,

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Speaker 1: January third, the US Treasury place sanctions on Beijing based

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Speaker 1: cybersecurity company for its alleged role in multiple hacking incidents

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Speaker 1: targeting critical US infrastructure. Here to discuss the latest Chinese

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Speaker 1: hacking incidents and what it means in the larger picture.

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Speaker 1: I'm really pleased to welcome back my guest, doctor Waifong Zhong,

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Speaker 1: Senior Advisor for the Office for Fiscal and Regulatory Analysis

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Speaker 1: at the America First Policy Institute. He is a co

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Speaker 1: creator of the Policy Change Index, an open source project

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Speaker 1: that users ai to analyze and predict government's actions based

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Speaker 1: on their words. Waifong, welcome and listen. Thank you so

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Speaker 1: much for joining me once again on Newsworld.

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Speaker 2: Thank you very much for having me missed a speaker.

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Speaker 1: Now, before we talk about the Treasury Department hack, I

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Speaker 1: want to go back and start with salt typhoon. What

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Speaker 1: is salt typhoon and what have they been accused of doing.

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Speaker 2: The Salt Typhoon, which may or may not be directly

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Speaker 2: related to the sanctions that was announced this time, was

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Speaker 2: one of the many state sponsor hacking attacks led by

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Speaker 2: Chinese hackers and fundamentally sponsored and supported by the Chinese regime.

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Speaker 2: And things like this actually have happened repeatedly and much

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Speaker 2: more rampantly in recent years because the Chinese government has

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Speaker 2: been much more aggressive than before in collecting intelligence from overseas,

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Speaker 2: primarily from the American people. In American government, well.

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Speaker 1: As I understand it. In late twenty twenty four, US

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Speaker 1: officials announced that hackers affiliated with salt Typhoon had access

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Speaker 1: to computer systems of nine US talk communications companies, later

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Speaker 1: acknowledged to include Verizon AT and T T Mobile, Spectrum, Luhmann,

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Speaker 1: Consolidated Communications, and Windstream. I mean virtually the entire American system.

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Speaker 1: This has got to be over ninety percent of the system.

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Speaker 1: And yet we say that salt Typhoon access to computer

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Speaker 1: systems of ALLIHA and if I understand it correctly, we

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Speaker 1: believe they were able to access metadata of user calls,

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Speaker 1: text messages, including data and timestamps, source and destination IP addresses,

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Speaker 1: and phone numbers from over a million users, most of

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Speaker 1: which were located in the Washington, DC metro area. Now

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Speaker 1: I'm an amateur about this, but that strikes me as

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Speaker 1: a pretty amazing achievement. Can you walk us through what

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Speaker 1: we know so far about the whole process of hacked targeting,

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Speaker 1: and in particular what happened at the US Treasure Department.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, so for that, I think we should go back

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Speaker 2: to the beginning of the Internet in the early two thousands.

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Speaker 2: Now we are talking about the former Chinese President Hu

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Speaker 2: Jintao before think even took office, was that the CCP

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Speaker 2: had realized from the very beginning of the Internet age

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Speaker 2: that information is really critical. They recognized the importance of

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Speaker 2: controlling information flow not only domestically within China, but also

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Speaker 2: as much as possible elsewhere in the world. And that

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Speaker 2: has a lot to do with what we called in

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Speaker 2: the open source intelligence model. The CCP has prioritized, which

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Speaker 2: means that they believe, compared to espnage, you know, cultivating

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Speaker 2: spies around the world, simply collecting information on the Internet

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Speaker 2: could be very useful. And so that has led to

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Speaker 2: decades of efforts by the CCP to create the industry,

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Speaker 2: the complex between the Chinese government agencies and a lot

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Speaker 2: of tech firms in China to start collecting a lot

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Speaker 2: of information around the world, and the primary target of

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Speaker 2: that operation is the United States. Now, there are different

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Speaker 2: ways to go about, and China has exhausted all of them.

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Speaker 2: There's the hardware side of things, meaning that for example,

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Speaker 2: in the telecom network that we have, we have a

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Speaker 2: lot of Chinese made devices, and those devices primarily made

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Speaker 2: by Huawei. Those devices have many vulnerabilities and some of

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Speaker 2: those vulnerabilities are actually hidden, meaning that there could be

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Speaker 2: backdoor mechanisms that were left there when they were manufactured,

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Speaker 2: and then the CCP mail may not try to access

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Speaker 2: them until years later. And there's also software side of things.

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Speaker 2: Because hacking groups in China they have gotten very good

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Speaker 2: and they work with overseas mercenaries, some based in Russia,

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Speaker 2: some based in other, you know, many other countries, and

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Speaker 2: they took very complex routes eventually to get to information

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Speaker 2: resided in the United States. So it's a very very

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Speaker 2: sophisticated operation.

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Speaker 1: In response to this most recent hack, the US government

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Speaker 1: post sanctions on a Beijing based cybersecurity firm, Integrity Technology Group.

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Speaker 1: Can you explain who this company is and what is

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Speaker 1: connection to the Chinese Communist is.

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Speaker 2: I think the general public knows very little about individual

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Speaker 2: tech company cyber especially firms associated with cyber attacks in China,

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Speaker 2: for a very good reason, which is that the CCP

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Speaker 2: deliberate try to make all these companies very secretive, and

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Speaker 2: they oftentimes create different entities to conduct different operations. Even

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Speaker 2: if any single entity is sanctioned by the US, they

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Speaker 2: can create another one. They're just shelles for their operations,

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Speaker 2: and so it's very hard to actually find out. And

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Speaker 2: it's very interesting you mentioned that, mister speaker, that the

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Speaker 2: US government is sanctioned in one one such entity this time,

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Speaker 2: but there's so many of them, and the reason we

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Speaker 2: are getting more and more rampant attacks from China. I mean,

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Speaker 2: we have to think about it from our enemies perspective, Right,

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Speaker 2: So what's the costs and benefits the hackers or the

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Speaker 2: ccpeople consider. You know, if they initiate a hacking campaign

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Speaker 2: against the US, if they succeed, they got a lot

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Speaker 2: of information.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: If they fail, at least by how things are standing now,

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Speaker 2: they lose one firm, particularly one shell they can easily replace.

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Speaker 2: We are really taking insufficient countermeasures to deal with this

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Speaker 2: huge problem.

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Speaker 1: It seems to the idea of sanctions against individual companies

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Speaker 1: when in fact it's a collective effort sponsored by and

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Speaker 1: supported by the Chinese government. When it's almost silly. That's

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Speaker 1: not a strategy, that's a public relations event.

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Speaker 2: That's like doing something as a gesture to say that

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Speaker 2: at least, you know, the administration is not sitting around,

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Speaker 2: even though they are pretty much sitting around there and

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Speaker 2: doing nothing. It's a very difficult problem to actually tackle

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Speaker 2: at the piecemeal mannor so, meaning that if find out

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Speaker 2: one firm you sanctioned them, when the tomorrow they will

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Speaker 2: be in a different firm, right, and so, which I

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Speaker 2: think justifies a more systematic approach to deal with the

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Speaker 2: Chinese hacking problems. For example, President Trump came out with

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Speaker 2: a very strong position eight years ago to ban Huawei,

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Speaker 2: which is a great policy because once we ban the hardware,

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Speaker 2: right it solves a lot of problem. It doesn't solve

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Speaker 2: all the problems, but it solves many problems, and so

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Speaker 2: we have to take broader measures. Another one I think

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Speaker 2: is very important we don't pay enough attention to is

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Speaker 2: that the US government itself is collecting a vast amount

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Speaker 2: of information of the American people. We need to make

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Speaker 2: the government smaller, even in the information sense, because right now,

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Speaker 2: all the government agencies they have a lot of information

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Speaker 2: about the American people. Their information security is very low,

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Speaker 2: and so once the Chinese hackers got the hang of

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Speaker 2: even just one agency, it could potentially get a lot

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Speaker 2: of information about the entire country, and I think that's

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Speaker 2: not a very good position to be in.

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Speaker 1: So in a very real sense, you could almost argue

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Speaker 1: that the Chinese are happy, did the American government gather

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Speaker 1: up the information so they can then hack the American

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Speaker 1: government and get all the stuff the American government's picked

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Speaker 1: up a taxpayer expense precisely.

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Speaker 2: That's the wholesales approach, right, And that's actually very easy

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Speaker 2: because if you look at holders of information on the

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Speaker 2: US market, private companies, they are more secure because they

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Speaker 2: have more resources to have a good defense. But government agencies,

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Speaker 2: because of many reasons, they don't have very good security measures.

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Speaker 2: But they are actually the biggest collector of information in

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Speaker 2: the country. For example, it just used a taxation as

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Speaker 2: an illustration. You know, if you have a very simple

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Speaker 2: tax system, then the American taxpayers would only need to

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Speaker 2: submit very little information to the RS, right. But when

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Speaker 2: you have a very compact system, many deductions, many loopholes,

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Speaker 2: then oftentimes people will have to submit information to justify

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Speaker 2: those loopholes. That information is than with the RS. So

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Speaker 2: all the CCP would need you to is to hack

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Speaker 2: the RS.

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Speaker 1: In terms of the inability of the US government to

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Speaker 1: defend itself. Fifteen, the Office of Personnel Management at a

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Speaker 1: data breach that exposed the personal information of over twenty

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Speaker 1: million government employees and contractors think about that scale. We

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Speaker 1: really don't understand the scale of the intensity of the Chinese.

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Speaker 2: Effort absolutely, and a very important thing we need to

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Speaker 2: focus on is how much our adversaries can make inferences

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Speaker 2: by different pieces of information. The OPM hacked, mister speaker

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Speaker 2: you mentioned, it's actually a huge deal. Why because there

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Speaker 2: are so many contractors in the Washington, DC area who

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Speaker 2: worked with the government, right, and sometimes they don't disclose

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Speaker 2: at work on the website for obvious security reasons. But

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Speaker 2: if the OPM system is hacked, the CCP could find

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Speaker 2: out which federal contractors are working for the federal government

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Speaker 2: on which projects. Because when the federal government is off,

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Speaker 2: they're off too, right, So you can easily find out

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Speaker 2: likely how we're exactly they're associated. And a lot of

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Speaker 2: times this kind of piecemeal information, it's hard to make

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Speaker 2: a lot of influence when you have a little bit

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Speaker 2: of them. But if you have a lot of them,

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Speaker 2: which the Chinese government does, the actual intelligence would scale

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Speaker 2: up very quickly.

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Speaker 1: When you get data on twenty three million people, most

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Speaker 1: of whom aren't all that important and aren't involved in

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Speaker 1: national security. What did the Chinese do with all of them?

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Speaker 2: Well, there are two levels of intelligence. One is, if

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Speaker 2: you have the Trump campaign, you learn a lot, right,

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Speaker 2: that's obvious, But if you had millions of people, it's

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Speaker 2: helpful to think back at intelligence failure episodes of intelligence

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Speaker 2: failure in the past. In the US, the CI did

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Speaker 2: not see, for example, the Iranian revolution, right, And the

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Speaker 2: reason the GAY for that was, well, we didn't understand

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Speaker 2: the groundswell of puppy opinions. And that's something you can

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Speaker 2: learn about by having a vast amount of information on

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Speaker 2: a vast amount of people. The same is true for

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Speaker 2: Afghanistan too, right. So the US foolish they did not

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Speaker 2: see that the Taliban can come back so fast.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: That's again the piece of information that requires a lot

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Speaker 2: of pieces of information, So it's not really hacking a

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Speaker 2: key individual, but it's hacking an entire nation or entire

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Speaker 2: group of people.

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Speaker 1: With the rise of artificial intelligence, my guess is that

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Speaker 1: they can now scan and analyze and look for parallels

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Speaker 1: or connections on a scale we can't imagine. So twenty

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Speaker 1: three million files wouldn't be a big deal. Just let's

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Speaker 1: a computer keep grinding away at.

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Speaker 2: Them exactly with today's computation power. That's a no brainer.

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Speaker 2: I think it comes down to really the combination of

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Speaker 2: vast amount of data and then the advancing AI and computation.

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Speaker 2: So that allows us to extract patterns, right, because patterns

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Speaker 2: is what would tell us about trends, and trends are

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Speaker 2: more persistent the rise of the Taliban, Right, that's the

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Speaker 2: trend that's way more persistent than hacking any single Taliban leaders.

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Speaker 3: For example, I'm newt Gingrich.

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Speaker 1: Please watch Journey to America, my new documentary in PBS

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Speaker 1: about nine remarkable individuals who strengthen our country through their

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Speaker 1: pursuit of the American dream. From Albert Einstein to Hetty

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Speaker 1: Lamar to Zelmai Kalilazad. We explore how individual stories help

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Speaker 1: shape our national identity. Watch Journey to America premier on Tuesday,

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Speaker 1: January fourteenth to ten pm Eastern, nine pm Central on

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Speaker 1: PBS and the PBS app. So, in a sense, in

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Speaker 1: the cyber world, correct me if I've got this wrong,

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Speaker 1: But there's sort of a gray zone where you have

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Speaker 1: private sector hackers who may be Romanian or Russian or Chinese,

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Speaker 1: all collaborating off and on for different reasons, and some

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Speaker 1: of it's come My sense is that the amount of

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Speaker 1: money stolen or blackmailed is dramatically greater than we have

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Speaker 1: any understanding of and that in fact, banks don't want

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Speaker 1: to be open about it because they don't want people

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Speaker 1: to understand how limited their ability is to protect information.

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Speaker 1: You have an economic side, and then you have sort

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Speaker 1: of a national security political side. And yet with all

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Speaker 1: that stuff, the Chinese communist government's reaction is consistently, oh,

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Speaker 1: we don't do that. It isn't us now. Is it

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Speaker 1: conceivable to you that you could have this skill of

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Speaker 1: hacking coming from China without the toutlitarian state knowing it.

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Speaker 2: I think we should take it as just a joke.

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Speaker 2: On the CCP, they say many things, right, we didn't

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Speaker 2: do this, we didn't do that. But that might have

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Speaker 2: some truth at the beginning of the economic reforms, for example,

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Speaker 2: in the nineties, perhaps when China was trying to be

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Speaker 2: more open and there was some space between the state

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Speaker 2: sector and the private sector. But in the last twenty

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Speaker 2: years that no longer is the case. Even private companies

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Speaker 2: think about Huawei, where Huawei is a perfectly private company.

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Speaker 2: It's not perfect, but it's perfectly private company, but it's

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Speaker 2: under the full control by the state. So it's laughable

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Speaker 2: to think that all these activities are happening without the

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Speaker 2: CCP supporting even proactively.

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Speaker 1: Christopher Ray, the FBI director center a security conference in Germany, quote,

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Speaker 1: the cyber threat posed by the Chinese government is massive.

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Speaker 1: China's hacking program is larger than that of every other

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Speaker 1: major nation combined. Now should we respond to that?

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Speaker 2: I think we should go back to the cause and benefit,

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Speaker 2: to think in our adversaries perspective, to put us in

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Speaker 2: their shoes, because when they contemplate about hacking the United States,

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Speaker 2: the benefit now is much larger than it used to

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Speaker 2: be before because every additional piece of information they can

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Speaker 2: gather from the US that could be put together with

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Speaker 2: the information they had already gotten in their past and

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Speaker 2: make a lot more influences. So that's the network effect

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Speaker 2: of different pieces of information. When you have more pieces

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Speaker 2: of a puzzle, you see the picture very clearly. When

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Speaker 2: you only have a few pieces, it doesn't really mean much, right.

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Speaker 2: So the marginal return of hacking for the Chinese is increasing,

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Speaker 2: but the cause of hacking is decreasing, especially under the

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Speaker 2: Biden administration. Sometimes they would sanction one or two Chinese firms.

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Speaker 2: That's a huge problem. Now we can talk about what

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Speaker 2: kind of countermeasures are the best. We might hack back.

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Speaker 2: You know, we might impose punitive sanctions across the board

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Speaker 2: on Chinese goods or Chinese investments, for example. We could

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Speaker 2: think more about how to liberate the private sector in

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Speaker 2: coming up with better defense for the information in the

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Speaker 2: United States. But what we cannot do is to just

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Speaker 2: sanction one or two because we need to increase the

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Speaker 2: punishment the Chinese hackers will face because their reward is

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Speaker 2: increasing every single day.

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Speaker 1: For a very very long time, we were the dominant

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Speaker 1: player with the National Security Agency, and we had capabilities

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Speaker 1: of accessing and understanding information that was dramatically greater than

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Speaker 1: anybody else. How do you distinguish the efforts that we've

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Speaker 1: made over the years to maximize our intelligence capabilities with

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Speaker 1: the kind of things that the Chinese are doing.

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Speaker 2: I think the main difference is that sometimes US actors,

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Speaker 2: they do have the capabilities, but sometimes they are misdirected.

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Speaker 2: When we think about law enforcement in the United States,

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Speaker 2: oftentimes in recent years, they are more and more politicized, Right,

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Speaker 2: so you have all these ammunitions that are not really

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Speaker 2: pointed at the enemies, but our own people, and that's

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Speaker 2: not right. And the other thing is that for the

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Speaker 2: CCP is not a problem. They just enhance capabilities to

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Speaker 2: spy on anybody, including their own people, which is given already.

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Speaker 2: So they spile the China these people, but then increasingly

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Speaker 2: have their eyes overseas. They have their eyes on targets

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Speaker 2: like the United States and Europe, the UK. You know,

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Speaker 2: Europe and UK no longer quite method that much to

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Speaker 2: this CZ people. The US matters even more.

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Speaker 1: Somebody pointed out to me that a lot of places

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Speaker 1: around the world are buying Chinese equipment, for example, for

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Speaker 1: facial recognition, and that somebody who might be a covert

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Speaker 1: agent in one country could be picked up traveling another country.

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Speaker 3: By the cameras.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely absolutely, and.

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Speaker 1: Then they could analyze it and figure out who that

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Speaker 1: person is. And so they're really acquiring a worldwide ability

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Speaker 1: to gather information and spy on people on a scale

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Speaker 1: that's totally outside the nation state. I mean, it's genuinely global.

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Speaker 1: Does that fit with what you're saying.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, And I think the Chinese always had that plan,

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Speaker 2: you know, long ago. It's the same plant they're just

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Speaker 2: carrying through over the years. Mister speaker, you talked about

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Speaker 2: the facial condition from footage. Right, Let's say you penetrate

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Speaker 2: one country in whatever footage it have. That doesn't really

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Speaker 2: mean a lot, but when you panish it enough, then

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Speaker 2: you can figure out other agents. Right, So it really

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Speaker 2: needs the scale of the operation.

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Speaker 1: Let me ask you about a couple of things beyond

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Speaker 1: cyber How did you interpret the school bus size spy

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Speaker 1: balloon in twenty twenty three.

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Speaker 2: I think that what was most striking to me was

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Speaker 2: the incapabilities of our administration to respond. It took forever

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Speaker 2: to shout have done in the first place. But they

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Speaker 2: also came out initially to say the balloons were not

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Speaker 2: collecting information in the US, and then they later admitted, okay, sorry,

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Speaker 2: they are collecting information in the United States. This is

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Speaker 2: just incapabilities. I think we should not shy away from

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Speaker 2: recognizing that. A lot of responsibilities on our end. But

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Speaker 2: the Chinese they always try to do that, right, and

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Speaker 2: then the weather balloons, and then they tried to use

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Speaker 2: it for other information collection purposes. I have to say

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Speaker 2: that's the same for any Chinese equipment, right, Chinese hardware,

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Speaker 2: they would sell smart devices around the world, and then

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Speaker 2: they would record those conversations by the customers, and then

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Speaker 2: they would send them back to China. It's the same thing.

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Speaker 1: Are you at all concerned about the degree to which

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Speaker 1: the Chinese are buying up US farmland, particularly near military basis.

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Speaker 2: I am very concerned about this. I'm not against, for example,

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Speaker 2: Chinese nationals purchasing property like a very broad rule in

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Speaker 2: the United States. Right we have a lot of Chinese

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Speaker 2: immigrants buying houses in the United States. That does not

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Speaker 2: necessarily become a national security issue. But when you buy

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Speaker 2: farm lands near military bases, that would be a huge problem.

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Speaker 2: In the past, some people think of that as like fear,

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Speaker 2: just have an anti Chinese sentiment or anti Asian sentiment.

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Speaker 2: Let's look at the track records of the CCP, like

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Speaker 2: what kind of information have they been collecting? And it

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Speaker 2: is true that they exhaust all sorts of means possible

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Speaker 2: to spy on American people. So I think it's much

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Speaker 2: more well justified fear than it was before.

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Speaker 1: One other topics that is sort of unavoidable when you're

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Speaker 1: talking about the Internet in China and that's TikTok. Do

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Speaker 1: you think that an American could buy TikTok liberated from

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Speaker 1: Chinese control and actually keep it going without the Chinese

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Speaker 1: having such dense penetration of the system that it's inevitably

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Speaker 1: enabling them to in various ways to store what's going on.

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Speaker 2: That's a really tricky issue. So there are two levels

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Speaker 2: I think to look at this. One is should TikTok

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Speaker 2: exist in its current form in the United States, And

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Speaker 2: the second is whether it's even possible to ban it

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Speaker 2: right or change its form. I'm less certain about the

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Speaker 2: second one, but I'm very certain about the first one,

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Speaker 2: meaning that TikTok in its current form should not exist

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Speaker 2: in the United States because of the level of information

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Speaker 2: collection on the app. There are many, many studies about

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Speaker 2: this and the way that they penetrates information not only

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Speaker 2: just on users' behavior scoring the app on the phone,

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Speaker 2: but also other information the users has on their phone

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Speaker 2: could potentially come through the app and be obtained by

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Speaker 2: the CCP. Even passwords you use on your bank could

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Speaker 2: potentially be sent over to the CCP. So that's a

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Speaker 2: huge problem. Now, how is it even possible to ban TikTok?

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Speaker 2: I think that's harder to address because there's the First

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Speaker 2: Amendment issues there. I think the best outcome might be

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Speaker 2: to force a sale to an American entity such that

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Speaker 2: we can have better protection without having to eliminate the

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Speaker 2: app in the US market.

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Speaker 1: So let's tell you did so, TikTok. Would that mean

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Speaker 1: that the hardware would have to be inside the unitiztation?

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Speaker 1: Isn't part of the problem right now that the ultimate

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Speaker 1: center of information flows in China?

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Speaker 2: Exactly? I think it all comes down to hardware.

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Speaker 1: So someonew I have to literally transfer the American TikTok

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Speaker 1: And does that that mean you're transferring the world wide

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Speaker 1: TikTok or would the non American parts still be Chinese.

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Speaker 2: As it is now? TikTok claim that they have under

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Speaker 2: gone a measure to enhance data security. That's what they claim,

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Speaker 2: And what that meant is there is I think a

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Speaker 2: US entity hardware that it ultimately stored the information, But

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Speaker 2: ironically the information first comes through China and goes to

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Speaker 2: the US hardware and then stay there. That doesn't really

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Speaker 2: help a lot or a single bit because the CCP

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Speaker 2: has the more. It's really a joke to say that

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Speaker 2: that's a security measure. So eventually I think the real

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Speaker 2: secure way would require information to not flow through mainland China.

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Speaker 2: At all, and then to prevent any Chinese entity from

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Speaker 2: ever accessing the US portion of the information. Now, the

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Speaker 2: CCP might want to have access to the Chinese version

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Speaker 2: of TikTok and to the extended overseas TikTok and the

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Speaker 2: Chinese allies, and that's a problem beyond the United States.

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Speaker 2: But at least we should make sure that the US

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Speaker 2: portion of it is secure.

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Speaker 3: As you know it.

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Speaker 1: Study published last Thursday asserts TikTok's algorithms promote Chinese Communist

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Speaker 1: Party narratives and suppressed content critical of those narratives. Claim

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Speaker 1: that TikTok forcefully denies entitled the CCP's digital charm offensive.

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Speaker 1: The study by the Rutgers University based Network Contgent Research

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Speaker 1: Institute argues that much of the pro China content originates

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Speaker 1: from state link entities. Byte Dance, a Chinese technology company,

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Speaker 1: owns TikTok. What should we be doing about that?

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Speaker 2: There's suddenly validity to the findings. I see that as

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Speaker 2: just a small function of TikTok, meaning that yes, it's

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Speaker 2: a popular app, it has a wide reached in the

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Speaker 2: American audience, and so any censorship or propaganda on this network,

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Speaker 2: it's going to affect a lot of American people. But

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Speaker 2: I think that's an obvious trivial way. The Charum reference

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Speaker 2: in this example is that they're trying to put out

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Speaker 2: content that would put the cc in a more positive

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Speaker 2: light and put US politics in the negative lighte the

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Speaker 2: CCP always does anyway with any other outlets they have.

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Speaker 2: But a harder problem is actually that because TikTok app

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Speaker 2: is so addictive, it's addicted to many people so that

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Speaker 2: they keep scrolling on the app for more and more videos, right,

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Speaker 2: And the process of that is the reason TikTok is

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Speaker 2: so popular. The algorithm actually tries to learn your preferences,

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Speaker 2: They learn what you like and not like, and they

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Speaker 2: try to recommend more content for you to keep looking.

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Speaker 2: And the fact that they're so successful means that they

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Speaker 2: have already figured out the preferences of the American people,

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Speaker 2: which means that they understand again going back to the

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Speaker 2: grounds well issue here, right, So they understanding the US

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Speaker 2: population at the deeper and deeper level every single day,

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Speaker 2: and that would help them make a lot of valuable

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Speaker 2: judgment about where this country is going, what people might

435
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Speaker 2: do in various different locations, including in actions and that's

436
00:25:59,240 --> 00:25:59,920
Speaker 2: very concerning.

437
00:26:01,040 --> 00:26:04,400
Speaker 1: So in a sense where we rely on say, national

438
00:26:04,440 --> 00:26:07,520
Speaker 1: polling of two or three thousand sample, they actually have

439
00:26:08,240 --> 00:26:11,400
Speaker 1: tens of millions of pieces of data that give them

440
00:26:11,480 --> 00:26:15,400
Speaker 1: dramatically richer and deeper insights into who we are.

441
00:26:16,040 --> 00:26:19,200
Speaker 2: And that's oftentimes the future generation of the American people.

442
00:26:34,119 --> 00:26:37,800
Speaker 1: Given everything we've talked about, if the United States wanted

443
00:26:37,800 --> 00:26:42,280
Speaker 1: to undertake a grand strategy to raise the cost to

444
00:26:42,400 --> 00:26:44,840
Speaker 1: the Chinese counties government to such a point that they

445
00:26:44,840 --> 00:26:48,600
Speaker 1: would actually cut off this behavior and police against it,

446
00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:51,159
Speaker 1: what would that kind of a strategy look like.

447
00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:55,760
Speaker 2: Well, that's hard to contemplate, and the problem is that

448
00:26:55,760 --> 00:26:58,120
Speaker 2: once you're contemplated, it might lose some of the effect

449
00:26:58,880 --> 00:27:01,360
Speaker 2: because in the end and at some point it becomes

450
00:27:01,359 --> 00:27:05,679
Speaker 2: the same thing as talking about military deterrence. Chinese has

451
00:27:05,720 --> 00:27:08,520
Speaker 2: a lot of military power too, and it's not using

452
00:27:08,560 --> 00:27:11,680
Speaker 2: against the US yet, right and so we want china

453
00:27:11,800 --> 00:27:14,800
Speaker 2: cyber attack to be like its military power to not

454
00:27:14,880 --> 00:27:17,840
Speaker 2: be used upon the US and its allies. But right

455
00:27:17,880 --> 00:27:20,080
Speaker 2: now it is being used by US and its airlines.

456
00:27:20,520 --> 00:27:22,320
Speaker 2: It comes down to deterrence, and there are so many

457
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:26,160
Speaker 2: ways of deterrence. I think it may not necessarily mean

458
00:27:26,359 --> 00:27:29,600
Speaker 2: cyber deterrence, you could deter Chinese in other ways, right.

459
00:27:29,800 --> 00:27:35,359
Speaker 2: For example, threatening certain severing of incongabborations with the Chinese

460
00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:38,320
Speaker 2: in some areas like punitive terrorists might be a way.

461
00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:41,000
Speaker 2: I'm sure the incoming president has a lot of ideas too.

462
00:27:41,080 --> 00:27:43,600
Speaker 2: I think, thinking too openly about it, it may not even

463
00:27:43,640 --> 00:27:45,080
Speaker 2: be a good idea. But I don't know. But if

464
00:27:45,080 --> 00:27:47,560
Speaker 2: you ask me, I would think that keeping the enemies

465
00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:52,960
Speaker 2: guessing and outlining some maximum response, we might go there.

466
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:55,479
Speaker 2: We don't necessarily go there, but we might go there someday.

467
00:27:55,480 --> 00:27:55,639
Speaker 1: You know.

468
00:27:55,680 --> 00:27:58,320
Speaker 2: Having this kind of range of actions to be known

469
00:27:58,480 --> 00:28:00,280
Speaker 2: by our adversaries will be the best.

470
00:28:00,600 --> 00:28:03,600
Speaker 1: This may be a minor thing, but we ought to

471
00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 1: seriously consider re establishing sort of a radio free China

472
00:28:08,520 --> 00:28:12,320
Speaker 1: and the kind of traditional propaganda we used against the

473
00:28:12,359 --> 00:28:16,600
Speaker 1: Soviet Union and the various satellite states, because somehow we

474
00:28:16,680 --> 00:28:21,639
Speaker 1: have to communicate that hostility can't be one sided, that

475
00:28:21,720 --> 00:28:24,320
Speaker 1: we can't be permanently on defense and they get to

476
00:28:24,320 --> 00:28:26,800
Speaker 1: come and play. We have to communicate that if they

477
00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:30,879
Speaker 1: actually want to engage in a genuine cold war, and

478
00:28:30,920 --> 00:28:33,119
Speaker 1: in a sense, this cyber offensive is part of a

479
00:28:33,119 --> 00:28:37,119
Speaker 1: cold war, then we have tools we can use too,

480
00:28:37,200 --> 00:28:40,920
Speaker 1: and they're in fact much more vulnerable to domestic discontent,

481
00:28:41,600 --> 00:28:44,240
Speaker 1: and I think probably more frightened of it than we

482
00:28:44,320 --> 00:28:47,000
Speaker 1: have any current notion. And I think back to the

483
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:51,280
Speaker 1: Typing rebellion, which costs about seventy five million lives in

484
00:28:51,360 --> 00:28:54,680
Speaker 1: the eighteen sixties and seventies. This is why Tenement Square

485
00:28:54,760 --> 00:28:57,960
Speaker 1: was so violent. They have a very clear sense that

486
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:01,920
Speaker 1: their population can get out of control much faster, much

487
00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:05,520
Speaker 1: more decisively than any free society. That may be the

488
00:29:05,560 --> 00:29:08,040
Speaker 1: wrong idea of the wrong approach, but it does seem

489
00:29:08,080 --> 00:29:11,120
Speaker 1: to me we can't continue to pretend that we are

490
00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:14,240
Speaker 1: totally at peace. Doesn't mean we have to do award militarily,

491
00:29:14,600 --> 00:29:17,040
Speaker 1: but we have to recognize we have a genuine adversary,

492
00:29:17,480 --> 00:29:20,400
Speaker 1: and every morning they have lots of people trying to

493
00:29:20,400 --> 00:29:22,840
Speaker 1: figure out how to cause us harm. And the harm

494
00:29:22,880 --> 00:29:25,560
Speaker 1: may be electronic, it may not be military, but it's

495
00:29:25,600 --> 00:29:27,800
Speaker 1: still harm absolutely.

496
00:29:27,840 --> 00:29:31,479
Speaker 2: And we often think about rightfully so, that the Chinese

497
00:29:31,480 --> 00:29:34,120
Speaker 2: regime is our adversary, right, but the Chinese people are

498
00:29:34,160 --> 00:29:37,360
Speaker 2: not right. You reference the TM and Square protests and

499
00:29:37,400 --> 00:29:40,280
Speaker 2: the violent crackdown, but even if you look at the

500
00:29:40,560 --> 00:29:45,240
Speaker 2: protests in many cities in China right before China lifted

501
00:29:45,240 --> 00:29:48,200
Speaker 2: the COVID restriction, the zero COVID restrictions a few years ago.

502
00:29:48,280 --> 00:29:51,760
Speaker 2: Right that basically came right after the wave of protests

503
00:29:51,760 --> 00:29:54,840
Speaker 2: happening in mainland China. It means that the Chinese feeple

504
00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:58,560
Speaker 2: actually they know, at least those more educated fraction of

505
00:29:58,600 --> 00:30:00,920
Speaker 2: the Chinese people who are able to get over the

506
00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:03,760
Speaker 2: Internet censorships, they know what's going on in the world,

507
00:30:03,920 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 2: and they see America as a better example of how

508
00:30:07,480 --> 00:30:11,200
Speaker 2: to govern right. And so the implication of that is, first,

509
00:30:11,320 --> 00:30:14,080
Speaker 2: you know, we need to change the direction our country

510
00:30:14,120 --> 00:30:17,640
Speaker 2: is currently going. We need to correct all these wrongs

511
00:30:17,800 --> 00:30:20,280
Speaker 2: that have happened, particularly in the last four years. We

512
00:30:20,360 --> 00:30:22,920
Speaker 2: need to move to the right direction because it sets

513
00:30:22,960 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 2: an example even for audiences in China. And the other

514
00:30:26,760 --> 00:30:30,160
Speaker 2: lesson I think is those people who know in China,

515
00:30:30,520 --> 00:30:33,800
Speaker 2: they're not getting the information from Radio Free China, not necessarily,

516
00:30:33,840 --> 00:30:36,120
Speaker 2: not exclusively, they're not getting it from the Voice of

517
00:30:36,160 --> 00:30:40,440
Speaker 2: America Mandarin channel necessarily because once they have the capabilities

518
00:30:40,440 --> 00:30:44,200
Speaker 2: to jump the Great Internet Firewall, they can see everything

519
00:30:44,200 --> 00:30:47,040
Speaker 2: in the world. Right, I'm not so much convinced about

520
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:52,960
Speaker 2: having to penetrate information flow into China because websites like

521
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 2: the Voa China would be banned anyway by the CCP. Right,

522
00:30:56,440 --> 00:30:59,040
Speaker 2: it really comes down to some people in China they

523
00:30:59,040 --> 00:31:01,880
Speaker 2: can come outside, and once they come outside, they see everything.

524
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:03,360
Speaker 2: They can see the New York Times, they can see

525
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:05,880
Speaker 2: the wats. In general, I think what we need to

526
00:31:05,880 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 2: do the most is to set a great example to

527
00:31:09,280 --> 00:31:11,320
Speaker 2: the Chinese people in the sense of being a good

528
00:31:11,320 --> 00:31:14,880
Speaker 2: influence right what a democracy should be and what open

529
00:31:14,920 --> 00:31:18,200
Speaker 2: society should be, and then hopefully more and more of

530
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:21,640
Speaker 2: them will be increasingly gravitating toward it.

531
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:24,760
Speaker 1: Is there a rule for us for a place to

532
00:31:24,880 --> 00:31:28,520
Speaker 1: try to help communicate how you can break through the

533
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,160
Speaker 1: various barriers or do they just naturally evolve on their

534
00:31:32,160 --> 00:31:32,920
Speaker 1: own Internally?

535
00:31:34,120 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 2: Well, so far has been evolving internally. There are what's

536
00:31:38,640 --> 00:31:42,120
Speaker 2: called VPN virtual Private network services in China that helps

537
00:31:42,120 --> 00:31:46,040
Speaker 2: people to get over the firewall. The CCP keeps cracking

538
00:31:46,080 --> 00:31:49,000
Speaker 2: down on those tools, so people will have to keep

539
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:52,240
Speaker 2: looking for new tools every other month. Some pro democracy

540
00:31:52,280 --> 00:31:55,360
Speaker 2: movement could take the form of providing the Chinese people

541
00:31:55,400 --> 00:31:56,560
Speaker 2: better access to internet.

542
00:31:56,720 --> 00:32:01,080
Speaker 1: That's a fascinating point. It's our generation's version of putting

543
00:32:01,080 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 1: out small radios in the nineteen fifties and sixties to

544
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:09,280
Speaker 1: try to penetrate the barriers is utterly fascinating. Boy fun look,

545
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:11,560
Speaker 1: I want to thank you for joining me and for

546
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:15,760
Speaker 1: helping us better understand the context of China's recent cyber

547
00:32:15,880 --> 00:32:19,800
Speaker 1: espionage efforts. Our listeners can follow your work by visiting

548
00:32:19,800 --> 00:32:24,120
Speaker 1: the America First Policy Institute's website at America Firstpolicy dot com.

549
00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:26,680
Speaker 1: And I really appreciate you being our guests again, and

550
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:30,080
Speaker 1: I'm confident as the world evolves, we're going to come

551
00:32:30,080 --> 00:32:32,680
Speaker 1: back to you for wisdom again in the future. But

552
00:32:32,720 --> 00:32:35,240
Speaker 1: thank you very much for sharing with us today.

553
00:32:35,640 --> 00:32:38,000
Speaker 2: Thank you very much for having me again, missed the speaker.

554
00:32:41,480 --> 00:32:44,160
Speaker 1: Thank you to my guest Waifong Zong. You can learn

555
00:32:44,160 --> 00:32:47,720
Speaker 1: more about the China cyber espionage efforts on our show

556
00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:50,880
Speaker 1: page at newtworld dot com. New Chorld is produced by

557
00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:55,160
Speaker 1: gangwid three sixty and iHeartMedia. Our executive producer is Guarnsey Sloan.

558
00:32:55,560 --> 00:32:59,200
Speaker 1: Our researcher is Rachel Peterson. The artwork for the show

559
00:32:59,440 --> 00:33:02,840
Speaker 1: which created by Steve Penley. Special thanks to the team

560
00:33:02,880 --> 00:33:06,000
Speaker 1: at Ginglish three sixty. If you've been enjoying Newtsworld. I

561
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:08,880
Speaker 1: hope you'll go to Apple Podcasts and both rate us

562
00:33:08,880 --> 00:33:11,440
Speaker 1: with five stars and give us a review so others

563
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:14,480
Speaker 1: can learn what it's all about. Right now, listeners of

564
00:33:14,560 --> 00:33:19,200
Speaker 1: Newtsworld consign up from my three freeweekly columns at ginglishree

565
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:24,400
Speaker 1: sixty dot com slash newsletter. I'm new Gingrich. This is Newtsworld.

566
00:33:37,960 --> 00:33:40,880
Speaker 1: I'm new Gingrich. Please watch Journey to America, my new

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