Biden Orders Probe into Risks of Chinese-Made High Tech Cars | China In Focus

Welcome to China In Focus, I'm Tiffany Meyer. Our top story, is your Chinese-made car spying on you? President Biden ordering a probe into threats posed by cars made in China. House Republicans reportedly introducing a new bill aimed at countering Beijing. It's being touted as the strongest anti-CCP measure in history. What we know about the countering Communist China Act. How sophisticated are China's disinformation campaigns? And how vulnerable or confident is America in preserving the 2024 election from Beijing's threats? Experts tell us more. And news from down under, Australia sending warnings to China over policing on Hawaii's closest neighbor. While the country's spy chief calls out a former politician, saying he sold out the country to a foreign spy ring. Chinese-made smart cars that can spy on Americans. President Biden flagging the issue Thursday, saying he would launch an investigation. In a statement, Biden said China is determined to dominate the future of the auto market, including through unfair practices. He noted China could flood the U.S. market with its vehicles, posing risks to our national security. And that he wouldn't let that happen on his watch. There are two main concerns. One, that the smart technology on the cars could collect sensitive data on Americans. And two, that bad actors in China could control the cars remotely, effectively disabling certain functions while cars are on the road. Biden administration officials laid out the risks. Most cars today are like smartphones on wheels. They're connected to the internet, to our phones, to other cars and to the companies that made them. They collect huge amounts of data on the drivers while being driven, including personal and biometric information. They also collect sensitive information on American roads and critical infrastructure. The problem with Chinese-made high-tech cars is that they could send that data back to China. Another headache is that these cars could be controlled remotely. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo touched on the issue, saying, quote, imagine there are hundreds of thousands of Chinese-connected vehicles on American roads that could be immediately disabled by somebody in Beijing. She said it's scary to contemplate the cyber risks. Worth noting, Beijing seems to have flipped the same script on American-made cars. In China, cars installed with foreign software are not allowed on the road. Tesla cars have also been banned from entering Chinese state compounds. Right now, American auto industry is protected from an overflow of cheap Chinese EVs by high tariffs, 25 percent, imposed during the Trump administration. But the threat seems here to stay. Chinese automakers are looking to evade tariffs by setting up plants in Mexico. Products entering the U.S. from the southern border enjoy much lower tariffs. And a U.S. trade group is sounding the alarm about that loophole, saying it poses an extinction-level threat to the U.S. auto sector. Chinese cars are backed by subsidies from the Chinese regime, allowing them to sell at very low prices and making it very hard for Western companies to compete. Tesla founder Elon Musk voiced similar concerns. Chinese automaker BYD recently beat Tesla in its global sales. Musk warned if Washington doesn't establish trade barriers, Chinese automakers will demolish most other car companies in the world. To discuss more about national security risks posed by Chinese-made smart cars, we sat down with Andrew Thornbrook, national security correspondent for The Epoch Times. Andrew Thornbrook, thank you so much for joining us. Great to have you back on the show. Thanks so much for having me, Tiffany. It's a pleasure to be here. Now, the Biden administration is investigating Chinese smart cars. This is for national security risks, such as collecting American status, spying on Americans or even being remotely controlled. How serious of a threat is this? Yeah, so the depth of this threat really remains to be seen, right? This is an issue that's pretty new in terms of the threat landscape. This isn't something we've been dealing with forever. So we're currently, I think, really investigating how far the threat goes in terms of how can the Chinese Communist Party use technologies imported into the United States to essentially feed data on Americans back to the party. Now, when it comes to remote control, China doesn't allow foreign software on cars in China. For instance, we see Tesla cars not being able to enter Chinese government compounds. How come they can operate in the U.S.? This is a longstanding grievance of the United States, of course, that Chinese Communist Party has for a long time had a rules for thee but not for we sort of way of coming at the geopolitical landscape. And a key part of that is that China wants to be able to export its products always and wants to be able to manufacture whatever it wants to manufacture, wants to be able to whatever it wants to sell, but it wants to have absolute control over what enters its own territory in a way that really flagrantly violates sort of the norms of the more the freer market system that the rest of the world really has. We are seeing that with BYD, where the starting price is about eleven thousand dollars for a brand new car, whereas the average price in America is forty seven thousand dollars. Many are noting that BYD has the backing of the Chinese Communist Party. They're not subsidized, unlike any of the companies in the U.S.. How does a country then even begin to deal with that when that is the competition? Yeah, well, I think the first part would be to eliminate their ability to compete. You know, and that's that's really what this is going to have to come down to eventually is, you know, you can't at least you can start with specific technologies like these information collecting technologies that are in these cars. And you say, OK, well, if you're going to send these cars, they can't have this, which is something the Chinese Communist Party might not be willing to do because they want these cars to have these railing capabilities. If Amazon were an adversarial nation, right, the strategy here is to underprice everyone else in the global global marketplace until they go out of business and China controls the market and then can make the price whatever they want. Andrew Thornbrook, thank you so much for your time. Thanks so much for having me, Tiffany. Pleasure to be here. Tesla's Chinese rival automaker BYD is boosting its lineup in a brutal price war. That's by launching a new electric supercar that could take on Ferrari priced at only two hundred and thirty thousand dollars. It's part of BYD's efforts to give more shares in the high end market as global demand in electrical cars wanes. BYD is also releasing bigger discounts on its newly released models. The Hans sedans and Tang hybrid SUV are priced up to 14 percent lower than previous versions. Chinese EV makers get strong backing from the Chinese Communist Party through measures like subsidies. But China made EVs are raising some concerns, partially due to reports of frequent fire incidents. A China-born researcher officially indicted in California a week ago. Authorities arrested him on charges of stealing missile tracking technology. Gong Chengguan is a U.S. citizen. Officials believed he transferred thousands of files from the research company he worked for to his personal storage devices. Some of those files contain blueprints for infrared sensors designed to track ballistic and hypersonic missiles. The documents also detail technology built to detect nuclear missile launches. A preliminary hearing was scheduled earlier for Tuesday, but neither Gong nor prosecutors took a stand in court. Officials then filed the indictment, pushing the case into its next step. Records shows that Gong has applied for China's state-backed talent programs several times. It all happened while he was working for U.S. tech firms. Beijing is known to recruit foreign-trained scientists through the initiative. A new effort aimed at countering China appears on Capitol Hill. Fox News reports that House Republicans are set to introduce a new bill on Thursday. The countering Communist China Act covers a lot of ground, from bolstering America's medical supply chain to deterring Chinese influence in American education and protecting U.S. intellectual property. If passed, the bill would also end the United States' permanent normal trade relations with China. Under it, China enjoyed favored market access to the United States. The agreement also keeps duties on Chinese imports low. The bill would also restrict outbound investments in Chinese tech companies, plus place trade restrictions on Chinese military and surveillance companies. The bill also looks to ban Chinese electronic vehicle batteries used on American military bases. Wednesday night, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York held a panel to discuss the evolution of Beijing's measures and how to prevent the Chinese Communist Party from meddling in the U.S. upcoming election. What insights did the panelists share? Let's take a listen. The most powerful job post in the world, the U.S. president will go back up for grabs this November. And one of Washington's top adversaries, China, has promised it won't meddle in America's election. But will China keep that promise? I think it'll be directed in the same way. That is not so much partisan or transparent, but really trying to continue to degrade the confidence that Americans have in their democratic institutions, continue to polarize an already polarized society, basically pushing at the weak points that are already there. Cutten Tebow is a senior resident fellow on China at the D.C. based Digital Forensic Research Lab. Different social media platforms advertising different takedowns that have kind of touched on Chinese networks that spread disinformation or that are involved in creating using A.I. technologies to generate fake profiles, et cetera, et cetera. If China becomes a salient issue in the 2024 election, and I expect it will, then we can expect this kind of activity in both the lead up and during and especially after the election. What can be done to stop Beijing from meddling? And I think at the base, it's this idea that we need to teach U.S. citizens to find reliable sources, to be skeptical about the news and they're getting to make sure that it's real and then to realize that there are a number of ways that that news is being turned into misinformation, disinformation. And you know that YouTube don't trust anything, right? Or TikTok don't trust anything. Let's go to a source that we know at least has got legitimate, reliable journalists. Back to Taiwan, Washington's strategic ambiguity about whether it would defend Taiwan if China invades has become a big part of Beijing's disinformation aimed at the island. China has raised concerns in Taiwan. There is a lot of skepticism about the reliability of the U.S. commitment. As Yimei Lun gets worse in Taiwan, the U.S. has to be ever stronger at offering Taiwan reassurance to be convincing. Hu Mingxuan is the co-founder and CEO of Taiwan's DoubleThink Lab, asked about why it's so important to speak out about what Taiwan is facing. More importantly, it is to seek further alliances within the democratic countries and then work together to counter such false information and cognitive warfare. In fact, this is helpful for the security and stability of the Indo-Pacific region. We'll keep you updated on the latest from Beijing and Washington as the 2024 election approaches. Now we turn to the Pacific, a warning to China from down under. Australia's Pacific minister saying Thursday that China should not be policing the Pacific Islands, adding that his country would train more security forces to fill the gap. This comes after the news that Chinese police are working in Kiribati, a Pacific nation and Hawaii's closest neighbor. Hawaii is home to a number of U.S. military bases. The U.S. also sent out warnings to Pacific Island countries, saying that importing security forces from China risks fueling regional and international tensions. The U.S. Coast Guard officials inspected two Chinese fishing boats with Kiribati police officers on board after news broke out of their working together, though they found no issues on board. Next, a strong accusation from Australia's spy chief. He said a former Australian politician sold out the country to a foreign spy ring and even proposed introducing a prime minister's family members into the spy's orbit. The spy chief, Mike Burgess, did not name the politician or the country of the foreign spy ring. He said the plot did not go ahead and Australian intelligence officials have disbanded the spy ring operation. The son of former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said he was approached by suspected Chinese agents. He said these agents are connected to a former New South Wales state Labour Party parliamentarian. He did not name the person. The Philippines president is currently visiting Australia. He's set to attend a summit of Southeast Asian nations in Melbourne next week. The two countries signed a deal on enhancing maritime cooperation. We'll collaborate even more closely to promote our shared vision for the region, including in civil maritime security, marine environment protection, maritime domain awareness and promoting respect for international law. The Philippines president also pledged to defend its territory as China ramps up aggression in the South China Sea. Over three trillion dollars of trade passes through this body of water every year. China claims almost all of it, despite having that claim ruled invalid by an international tribunal. That's all for today's China In Focus on YouTube. We're now sharing a shortened version of our program here after being demonetized for three years. If you'd like to support us, consider donating. Find us at DonorBox.org slash China-In-Focus or subscribe to our partner platform, Epic TV, where you can watch our full episodes. Here's what to look out for in our second half. Coming up, Beijing's censorship army reaching Western social media platforms like X. Why a Chinese influencer is asking his followers on X to unsubscribe. As China's youth unemployment rate breaks records, more college students are graduating and squeezing into the already overloaded job market. How bad is the situation? And an American performance wrapping up six shows in Miami, Florida. We hear from theatergoers, including a beauty pageant winner who praised the performance for its artistry. More on that after the break here on China In Focus. Thanks for watching China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. See you tomorrow.