China’s Internet giants from Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊) to ByteDance Ltd (字節跳動) have shared details of their prized algorithms with Beijing for the first time, an unprecedented move aimed at curbing data abuse that might end up compromising closely guarded corporate secrets.
China’s Internet watchdog on Friday published a list describing 30 algorithms that firms including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and Meituan (美團) employ to gather data on users, tailor personal recommendations and serve up content.
Although the public list stopped short of revealing the actual code, it was not clear the extent to which Internet firms may have revealed their underlying software to regulators in private.
The algorithms that decide which TikTok videos, WeChat posts and Instagram photos users see are considered the secret sauce of many online services, critical in capturing user attention and driving growth.
China in March adopted regulations that require Internet firms to disclose such tools, an effort to address complaints about data abuse that also helps regulators keep Internet firms on a tighter leash.
Tech industry algorithms are jealously guarded and have been at the heart of political controversies around the world.
That disclosure requirement sets China apart from countries such as the US, where Meta Platforms Inc and Alphabet Inc have argued successfully that algorithms are business secrets, even as lawmakers and privacy advocates seek to better understand how they curate content and manage data.
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) requires only basic information from the companies, but it might seek more details to investigation allegations of data contraventions, said Zhai Wei (翟巍), an executive director of the Competition Law Research Center at East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai.
China has been tightening regulations to rein in the once-unchecked expansion of the country’s tech giants. Last year, the country introduced the Personal Information Protection Law and the Data Security Law to set out tougher rules for how companies handle user data.
The algorithm list available for public review is confined to short descriptions of how they work, and the product and use cases where they apply.
For example, ByteDance says its algorithm discerns a user’s likes and dislikes to recommend content on apps including short-video platform Douyin (抖音), TikTok’s Chinese cousin. Meituan says its algorithms help dispatch meal orders to riders in the most efficient way based on their downtime and delivery route.
Under the regulations, companies must also submit nonpublic information to the CAC, including a self-appraisal on the security of the algorithms, the data they collect, whether that encompasses sensitive biometric or identity information, and what data sources are used to train algorithms.
The administration — which issued the guidelines in tandem with the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security and the State Administration for Market Regulation — said it would keep updating the list.
“The information provided by the companies to the CAC are much more detailed than what was published for sure, and that involves some business secrets, which is not possible to be released to the public,” Zhai said.
Apple Inc increased iPhone production in India by about 53 percent last year and now makes a quarter of its marquee devices there, reflecting the US company’s efforts to avoid tariffs on China. The company assembled about 55 million iPhones in India last year, up from 36 million a year earlier, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named because the numbers aren’t public. Apple makes about 220 million to 230 million iPhones a year globally, with India’s share of the total increasing rapidly. Apple has accelerated its expansion in the world’s most populous country in recent years, bolstered
HEADWINDS: The company said it expects its computer business, as well as consumer electronics and communications segments to see revenue declines due to seasonality Pegatron Corp (和碩) yesterday said it aims to grow its artificial intelligence (AI) server revenue more than 10-fold this year from last year, driven by orders from neocloud solutions clients and large cloud service providers. The electronics manufacturing service provider said AI server revenue growth would be driven primarily by the Nvidia Corp GB300 server platform. Server shipments are expected to increase each quarter this year, with the second half likely to outperform the first half, it said. The AI server market is expected to broaden this year as more inference applications emerge, which would drive demand for system-on-chip, application-specific integrated circuits
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) share of the global foundry market rose to almost 70 percent last year amid booming demand for artificial intelligence (AI), market information advisory firm TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said on Thursday. The contract chipmaker posted US$122.54 billion in revenue, up 36.1 percent from a year earlier, accounting for 69.9 percent of the global market, TrendForce said. Its share was up from 64.4 percent in 2024, it said. TSMC’s closest rival, Samsung Electronics, was a distant second, posting US$12.63 billion in sales, down 3.9 percent from a year earlier, for a 7.2 percent share of the global market. In the
At a massive shipyard in North Vancouver, Canadian workers grind metal beams for a powerful new icebreaker crucial to cementing the country’s presence in the increasingly contested arctic. Icebreakers are specialized, expensive vessels able to navigate in the frozen far north. And “this is the crown jewel,” said Eddie Schehr, vice president of production at the Seaspan shipyard. For Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who heads to Norway next Friday to observe arctic defense drills involving troops from 14 NATO states, Canada’s extreme north has emerged as a strategic priority. “Canada is and forever will be an Arctic nation,” he said ahead of
RSS