1. Cyberspace and Informatization Development in China
The Internet has been developing quickly in China in the past twenty years. By June 2014, penetration rate of the Internet was 46.9%, and there were 632 million Internet users, of which 527 million use mobile phone to access the Internet. There were 2.73 million websites, of which 1.27 use .cn as their domain name.
Internet companies have also been developing very rapidly in China. Among the top ten biggest companies of open market value, four of them are from China. The annual growth rate of Internet economy in China has been double-digit for years and is current at 30%, which is exceptional in the world. By June 2014, there were 332 million e-commerce customers, and annual revenue of e-commerce has been more than ten trillion. One Internet company, Alibaba, initiated November 11 Single’s Day on Sale from 2009, and the avenue of past five years were respectively, 100 million, 936 million, 5.2 billion, 19.1 billion and 35 billion.
Though there are all kinds of problems and further requirement for improvement, which have been discussed and debated contentiously in China for many years, from these achievements, we can reasonably deduce that, (1) China’ policy has been open without which it is impossible to have such rapid development. (2) Innovation capacity of China’s Internet companies has been proved to be strong enough to compete with international counterparts. (3) Management and administration of the Internet in China has been successful and orderly. (4) China’s experiences deserve more attention and can shed light on international discussion regarding cyberspace and Internet governance.
2. Different Models of Development and Governance
The Internet cuts the distance of people and connects all things together in the world. For this reason, we have seen obvious trend of convergence and interconnection in different countries, standard, operation system, application, devices etc. being unified worldwide. Nevertheless, on the other hand, differences such as business model, customers’ preferences and market structure etc. remain intact, or even become bigger in different countries, due to different language, culture, legal system, political regime as well as readiness for Informatization etc. There are more countries in the world today than twenty years ago, though globalization has transformed the world dramatically. For the same token, it is normal that there are different models of development and governance in different countries, and each country needs to find its own unique way of devel-opment according to its own circumstances. It is impossible to be successful by copying mechanically useful experiences from other countries.
There are several examples to illustrate the point just mentioned above.
In US, crowd funding company like Prodigy Network etc. has been developing very quickly. The same business model might not be operational in China because legal system is not as developed as in the US. If Chinese government doesn’t regulate the platform effectively, operators of the crowd funding company might desert after collecting money from the crowd, and investors sooner or later would resort to government for damages. This doesn’t mean China doesn’t need in-novation of crowd funding, it means China needs to have different regulatory arrangement. As a matter of fact, there have been more than 120 P2P platform operators in China deserting after a period of operation.
A more interesting comparison between China and US is their respective market structure and corresponding regulatory arrangement, which have been described by many commentators. In China, three biggest Internet companies, i.e., Tencent, Baidu and Alibaba, occupy the center stage of the Internet. The reason for this market structure is quite complex, mostly due to Chinese Internet user’s custom. Big Three in China can determine, to certain extent, life and death of other Internet
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companies. However, on the other hand, though Facebook has most populous users in the world, it is only one of applica-tions of American Internet users, and other applicaapplica-tions such as Instgram, Snapchat etc. are all well developed. Except user’s different custom, it is worthwhile to explore other reasons of the differences between two countries. Corresponding with different market structure, China adopts a concentrated way of management with more emphasis on stability and order, while US adopts more liberal way of management, leaving market play bigger role. American approach is without doubt more conducive to innovation, but other countries can hardly copy American social conditions.
Since different countries have different social conditions, it is incorrect to claim that there is only one universal path of development for all countries.
3. China’s Perspective on Cybersecurity and International Governance
China attaches great importance to Cybersecurity and international governance. General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out that “there is no national security without Cybersecurity, and there is no modernization without Informatization”. On July 16 this year, Mr. Xi Jinping gave a speech in Brazil, emphasizing the Internet has been bringing huge challenge for national sovereignty, security and development, and it has to be treated very seriously. The sovereignty of every country in the field of information should not be violated, though the Internet has strong characteristics of globalization. No matter how developed of the ICT, information sovereignty should not be violated. Every country has right to safeguard its own informa-tion security, and there is no dual standard for security. It is not acceptable that one country has security while others don’t have, or some countries have security while others don’t have. It is not permissible to seek one’s own absolute security by sacrificing other countries’ security. Based on the principle of mutual respect and trust, and through proactive cooperation, international society should jointly establish a peaceful, secure, open, and cooperative cyberspace, and formulate a multilat-eral, democratic and transparent international Internet governance structure.
4. Formulating a Balanced Layering Structure For Cybersecurity
Cybersecurity is a common issue for every country. To my understanding, domestic laws or regulations should formulate a balanced layering structure for Cybersecurity, which is compatible with characteristics of the Internet, and is effective to tackle problems of cyber threat.
The structure is as follows:
Different layer has different characteristics and its own threat, and government regulations needs to tackle different threat on the basis of differentiating layers in the first place. For this reason, principles, tools as well as focus of regulations etc.
should be quite different at different layers. So is the relationship between traditional laws and Internet specific laws.
Meanwhile, government regulations needs to treat all threat comprehensively, and takes a balanced approach. Balance means it is pivotal to handle all relationships, such as rights and obligations, public interest and personal freedom, devel-opment and security, degree of government regulations as well as alternative to regulations etc. In this regard, different countries need to have more understanding and exchange.
Information of the Internet Users of the Internet ISP or Platform of the Internet Critical Infrastructure of the Internet
50 ■ 2014 Northeast Asia Peace and Cooperation Initiative Forum