China has big ideas for the internet. Too bad no one else likes them

Political and technological problems might sink China’s New IP plan, hey dude shoesbut China could reshape the internet in subtler ways.

China wants a shiny new internet — and you may like what the country has in mind. Its plan promises a network fast enough to show you as a live hologram in a video chat, secure enough to block data deluge attacks that crush websites, flexible enough to easily accommodate Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite-powered broadband and responsive enough to let you drive a car remotely.

But there’s a big problem with this proposal, called New IP, that Huawei and China’s three powerful state-owned telecommunications companies are pushing. It’s freighted with political and technological baggage that mean its chances for success are low.

New IP would shift control of the internet, both its development and its operation, to countries and the centralized telecommunications powers that governments often run. It would make it easier to crack down on dissidents. Technology in New IP to protect against abuse also would impair privacy and free speech. And New IP would make it harder to try new network ideas and to add new network infrastructure without securing government permission, say critics in the competing effort to improve existing internet technology.

“What problem is it the Chinese think they’re going to solve? The problem is they’re not in control. They want to be in control of the internet,” said James Lewis, director of the Technology Policy Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC, in an interview.

At stake is the future of one of the most important technologies humans have ever invented. skechers outlet The internet has proved to be remarkably adaptable, growing from a US government-funded academic research project into a world-spanning foundation for communications, commerce and entertainment. The New IP issue is heating up ahead of the World Telecommunication Standardization Assembly (WTSA-20) in November, where allies hope to cement its status.

China can influence the internet even without New IP by spreading its current technology and practices. Some observers, including former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, fear a “splinternet,” where today’s global network fragments into incompatible national networks.

In the US, the Trump administration hasn’t taken on New IP directly. But it’s been pushing hard to undermine Chinese economic influence and counter China’s effort to lead in technology like 5G mobile networks and artificial intelligence. In a speech Thursday, Attorney General William Barr said China plans “to dominate the world’s digital infrastructure.”

As part of CNET’s focus on China’s place in the technology world, here’s a look at how the country is trying to push the internet in new directions, and how some existing powers are pushing back.

China’s New IP proposal arrives

The New IP proposal emerged at a 2019 meeting of the International Telecommunication Union, a UN agency where countries hash out computing and communications matters. Proposal backers are Chinese network equipment maker Huawei — yes, the company whose products the US government is trying to ban around the world — along with Huawei’s US research arm, Futurewei Technologies, the Chinese government’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and China’s three main telecommunications companies: China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom.

Huawei said in one presentation that New IP would offer higher data rates and shorter communication delays than today’s prevailing internet standard, TCP/IP. That stands for Transmission Control Protocol, the rules that ensure network data arrives at its destination, and Internet Protocol, which governs how data is broken up into packets and independently routed across many network hops to the final destination.