For more than a decade, American technology companies — household names in computing, software, and semiconductors — quietly became architects of one of history's most expansive surveillance states, selling billions in tools to Chinese authorities even as evidence mounted that those tools were being turned against ethnic minorities and political dissidents. An Associated Press investigation, drawing on leaked documents, procurement records, and over a hundred interviews, reveals that the complicity was not incidental but systematic, spanning facial recognition, predictive policing, DNA databas
AP Investigation: U.S. Tech Giants Built China's Surveillance State
Hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs and Tibetans were tagged as potential terrorists by predictive policing systems; surveillance technology enables systematic persecution of religious minorities and political dissidents.
They sold billions despite repeated warnings the tools enabled human rights abuses
Mark
Why does it matter that American companies built this? Couldn't China have developed these systems on their own?
Mimi
They could have, eventually. But the investigation shows these weren't just sales—they were collaborations. IBM engineers worked with Chinese contractors to design the systems. Dell marketed specific features to Chinese police. The speed and sophistication of China's surveillance state was substantially accelerated by having access to proven American technology rather than building from scratch.
Luke
But we should be careful here. The investigation documents what was sold and when. It doesn't quantify how much of China's surveillance infrastructure actually depends on American tech versus Chinese-built alternatives. We know IBM's i2 software was copied by Landasoft, but how many systems actually run on that versus homegrown Chinese code?
Mark
The companies say they didn't know the technology would be used for ethnic repression. Is that credible?
Mimi
The investigation found that Congress and media outlets repeatedly warned these companies that surveillance tools were being used to suppress dissent and target minorities. Dell was still selling to Xinjiang police in 2022, years after the repression there was widely known. That's not ignorance—that's a choice.
Luke
True, but there's a distinction worth holding. Some of these sales happened before the Xinjiang crackdown became widely documented in Western media. IBM's work with the military contractor was in 2009. The i2 software sales to police were throughout the 2010s—the major international reporting on Xinjiang detention camps came around 2018. We can't retroactively apply knowledge companies didn't have. But once it was public, continuing to sell becomes harder to defend.
Mark
What's the actual human impact here? How many people were harmed?
Mimi
The investigation mentions that Landasoft's predictive policing platform tagged hundreds of thousands of people as potential terrorists. That's not abstract—those people were flagged for surveillance, detention, or worse based on systems built on American software. And the DNA collection infrastructure means genetic data on Uyghurs and Tibetans is being stored and used by police.
Luke
Right, but the investigation doesn't quantify total harm or connect specific abuses to specific American technologies. We know the systems exist and were used during a period of documented repression. We don't have a clear accounting of how many people were detained or harmed because of American tech versus Chinese-developed systems. That's an important gap.
Mark
What happens now? Can the U.S. government stop this?
Mimi
Export controls exist, but the investigation found they're narrow in scope. Some companies maintain research centers in China and continue marketing to police. The restrictions on mapping software came in 2020, but Esri still has a Beijing research center. It's not clear the current framework actually prevents this.
Luke
And enforcement is another question entirely. The investigation documents what happened, but we don't know what penalties, if any, these companies will face. Some didn't respond to AP requests for comment. Without enforcement teeth, export controls are just suggestions.
The Pulse
- Hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs and Tibetans were flagged as potential terrorists by predictive policing systems built, in part, on software originally sold by American firms like IBM.
- The investigation exposes a decade-long pattern of sales continuing even after Congress issued warnings and media documented ethnic repression — suggesting willful blindness, not mere oversight.
- Nearly every category of surveillance technology has an American fingerprint: facial recognition, fingerprint databases, DNA sequencing kits, AI cameras, encrypted radios, and mapping software that alerts police when minorities cross provincial lines.
- Most implicated companies responded with legal deflection — citing export control compliance — while some maintained research centers and active marketing in China even after sanctions targeted their partners.
- US export controls remain too narrow to close the gap, leaving a legal architecture that permits the sale of tools whose human cost is already documented and undeniable.
For more than a decade, American technology companies — household names in computing, software, and semiconductors — quietly became architects of one of history's most expansive surveillance states, selling billions in tools to Chinese authorities even as evidence mounted that those tools were being turned against ethnic minorities and political dissidents. An Associated Press investigation, drawing on leaked documents, procurement records, and over a hundred interviews, reveals that the complicity was not incidental but systematic, spanning facial recognition, predictive policing, DNA databases, and AI cameras deployed across Xinjiang and Tibet. The story asks an old and uncomfortable question: when commerce and conscience collide, which wins — and who pays the price when commerce does?
An Associated Press investigation has revealed that American technology companies played a far larger role in constructing China's surveillance infrastructure than previously known, selling billions of dollars in tools to Chinese police and government agencies even as the repression those tools enabled became impossible to ignore.
The investigation drew on tens of thousands of leaked emails, confidential corporate and government documents, Chinese-language marketing materials, and more than a hundred interviews with engineers, executives, and officials on both sides of the Pacific. The picture that emerges spans nearly every dimension of modern surveillance.
IBM collaborated with a Chinese military contractor as early as 2009 to design national intelligence systems later used by China's Ministry of State Security. Its policing analysis software, i2, was sold to Xinjiang police throughout the 2010s and subsequently copied by a former IBM agent to build a predictive policing platform that flagged hundreds of thousands of people as potential terrorists. Dell and VMWare sold cloud and storage technology to Tibetan and Xinjiang police as recently as 2022. Oracle and Microsoft supplied software embedded in Chinese policing systems. Intel, in its own 2019 marketing materials, described a fingerprint system it enhanced with a Xinjiang police supplier as 'fully tested in an actual application scenario' with a municipal police bureau.
Facial recognition and AI cameras tell a similar story. NVIDIA and Intel partnered with China's largest surveillance companies to integrate AI into camera networks across Xinjiang and Tibet until sanctions intervened. Sony announced it had equipped a Chinese prison with 'intelligent' cameras. Thermo Fisher Scientific marketed DNA kits explicitly designed for China's national database and for identifying ethnic minorities including Uyghurs and Tibetans — language that remained on its website until the AP made contact.
Additional American contributions include encrypted radios from Motorola, surveillance-optimized hard drives from Seagate and Western Digital, and mapping software from IBM, Oracle, and Esri that powers a police geographic system alerting authorities when Uyghurs, Tibetans, or dissidents cross regional boundaries.
Most companies responded by citing compliance with export controls — a defense that the investigation implicitly challenges, given that those controls remain narrow in scope and have not prevented the continued marketing of surveillance tools to Chinese police. Some firms maintain active research centers in China even after sanctions were imposed on their partners. The gap between legal compliance and moral accountability, the investigation suggests, has rarely been wider.
An investigation by the Associated Press has documented how American technology companies designed and constructed the infrastructure underlying China's vast surveillance apparatus, playing a substantially larger role in enabling human rights abuses than previously disclosed. The companies sold billions of dollars in surveillance tools to Chinese police, government agencies, and security contractors, continuing these transactions even after Congress and media outlets repeatedly warned that such systems were being deployed to suppress dissent, persecute religious minorities, and target ethnic groups.
The investigation rested on tens of thousands of leaked emails and databases from Chinese surveillance firms, thousands of pages of confidential corporate and government documents, Chinese-language marketing materials, and procurement records. Researchers conducted more than one hundred interviews with current and former engineers, executives, and officials from both China and the United States. While American companies dominated the market, firms from Germany, Japan, and South Korea also participated.
The scope of involvement spans nearly every category of surveillance technology. IBM collaborated with a Chinese military contractor in 2009 to design national intelligence systems, including counterterrorism infrastructure later used by China's Ministry of State Security and military. IBM agents in China sold the company's i2 policing analysis software to Xinjiang police and other units throughout the 2010s. A former IBM agent, Landasoft, subsequently copied and deployed i2 as the foundation for a predictive policing platform that flagged hundreds of thousands of people as potential terrorists during the crackdown in Xinjiang. IBM stated it ended relations with Landasoft in 2014 and prohibited sales to police in Xinjiang and Tibet beginning in 2015.
Dell and its then-subsidiary VMWare sold cloud software and storage devices to police and data-providing entities in Tibet and Xinjiang as recently as 2022, even as the ethnic repression occurring there had become widely documented. In 2019, Dell marketed on WeChat a "military-grade" AI-powered laptop developed with surveillance firm Yitu that offered "all-race recognition" for Chinese police. Oracle and Microsoft supplied software used in Chinese policing systems, including those operating in Xinjiang. For fingerprint recognition infrastructure, IBM worked with Chinese defense contractor Huadi to construct the national fingerprint database. HP and VMWare sold technology used for fingerprint comparison by police. Intel, in 2019 marketing material, stated it had partnered with Hisign, a Chinese fingerprinting company selling to Xinjiang police, to enhance their fingerprint readers, describing the new system as "fully tested in an actual application scenario" with a municipal police bureau.
Facial recognition and AI camera systems represent another major category. IBM, Dell, Hitachi, and VMWare promoted facial recognition for police use. Sony announced on its official WeChat account that it had equipped a Chinese prison with "intelligent" cameras. NVIDIA and Intel partnered with China's three largest surveillance companies to integrate AI capabilities into camera systems deployed across China, including in Xinjiang and Tibet, until sanctions took effect. As recently as 2022, NVIDIA posted on WeChat that Chinese surveillance firms Watrix and GEOAI used its chips to train AI patrol drones and systems identifying people by their gait.
The investigation also uncovered involvement in DNA collection infrastructure. Chinese police DNA laboratories purchased Dell and Microsoft software and equipment for storing genetic data. Hitachi advertised DNA sequencers to Chinese police in 2021. Thermo Fisher Scientific's website, until contacted by the AP in August, stated that its kits were designed for China's national DNA database and specifically for the Chinese population, including "ethnic minorities like Uyghurs and Tibetans," and featured work by a Chinese police researcher who discussed using Thermo Fisher kits to identify ethnic Uyghur and Manchu populations. Thermo Fisher halted sales in Xinjiang in 2021 and in Tibet in 2024 but continues promoting kits to police elsewhere in China.
Additional technologies supplied by American firms include encrypted radio communications from Motorola for handling "sudden and mass events in Beijing," specialized hard drives from Seagate, Western Digital, and Toshiba optimized for AI video surveillance systems, and mapping software from IBM, Oracle, and Esri that powers China's Police Geographic Information System—tools that alert authorities when Uyghurs, Tibetans, or dissidents cross provincial or county boundaries. Samsung sells microSD cards for police body cameras, while Philips equipment appears in Chinese police body cameras, though Philips denied authorizing such sales.
Most companies either declined to comment or stated they adhere to export controls and regulations. IBM, Dell, Cisco, Amazon Web Services, Seagate, Intel, Thermo Fisher, and Western Digital asserted compliance with relevant laws. The Chinese government defended its surveillance systems as necessary for counterterrorism and criminal prevention, rejecting characterizations of ethnic targeting. The investigation reveals that despite public knowledge of systematic repression and repeated warnings from Congress, American technology companies continued supplying the tools that enable that repression, with some maintaining research centers and marketing operations in China even after sanctions were imposed on surveillance firms.
Notable Quotes
If older systems are being abused today and IBM has no knowledge that they are, the misuse is entirely outside of IBM's control, was not contemplated by IBM decades ago, and in no way reflects on IBM today.— IBM statement to AP
They're optimized and adapted for security systems.— Toshiba sales director Feng Hao, describing surveillance hard drives
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