Latin American Scientists Call for ‘Clear Rules’ Regarding China’s Quantum Internet Experiments

(Dialogo.com) This “Digital Military Magazine” discusses what it sees as China’s goal of achieving cyberspace dominion. In 2017, Beijing started quantum Internet experiments with a network of satellites and computers that could share information worldwide at an unprecedented high speed.
“With this technology, China seeks to control global information sharing and become a protagonist worldwide,” Luis Gómez, sociologist and academic at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM, in Spanish), told Diálogo. “If a superpower, [regardless of] its ideology or policy, dominates information, it can do whatever it wants with other countries,” added Leobardo Hernández, head of the Computer Lab at UNAM’s Aragón Technological Center.
“The Chinese government seeks to launch a group of quantum satellites into high orbits to increase coverage,” Hernández said. “It’s naive to think that Internet use will be confidential,” Gómez added. “When China has a certain degree of hegemony, it will have much more access to information.”
Gómez and Salazar said that if China builds a quantum Internet infrastructure, Latin American countries and nations worldwide must adopt clear rules limiting use of the technology to charitable activities. Technological progress should not be used for indoctrination, or as a war weapon in any scenario.
“[It’s] a scenario where governments and companies would face an unprecedented risk, since cyberspace is the new battlefield for crime and terrorism. Latin America would be no exception,” Salazar said.