Purges of Top Tech Officials Show Cracks in China’s Big Data Ambitions

Officials are often detained in secret, disappear from public view, and are quietly removed from their posts.

The public visit Data Analysis Center during the 2017 China International Big Data Industry Expo at Guiyang International Eco-Conference Center in Guiyang, China, on May 27, 2017. Lintao Zhang/Getty Images

News Analysis

As U.S.-China tensions escalate over tech and national security, a new wave of corruption scandals is shaking the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) big data sector, one of the regime’s most strategically important industries.