China’s policing modernisation could offer lessons for Europe

The European Union has embarked on a bold new era in tech policy under EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, putting ‘technological sovereignty’ at the heart of the political programme. Her 2024-2029 agenda seeks to foster EU innovation in strategic sectors like AI, clean tech, and biotechnology. She even created the position of Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security, and Democracy, appointing Henna Virkkunen as its first postholder in 2024. However, when it comes to sensitive technology like policing software, the EU is heavily dependent on foreign providers, threatening the very technological sovereignty it seeks to secure. Despite China’s own serious democratic and privacy limitations, there are lessons for Europe in its approach to police technology.

The risks of outsourcing

Many law enforcement agencies across Europe rely on external – often non-EU – providers for critical policing technology, such as predictive analytics, surveillance platforms, and cloud infrastructure. For instance, Clearview AI, a US company, has provided facial recognition technology to law enforcement in several EU countries, including France, Belgium and Italy. In Germany, authorities have outsourced operations to firms like Palantir – a policing intelligence platform criticised for its opaque operations and ties to US intelligence. 

This outsourcing creates risks to democratic oversight and data privacy. For example, in 2023, the German Federal Constitutional Court ruled that police use of Palantir-style surveillance software in Hesse and Hamburg violated the constitutional right to informational self-determination due to vague legal provisions, lack of safeguards, and disproportionate data analysis. These concerns are exacerbated by geopolitical threats, including espionage from China and sabotage by Russia, which have intensified calls for European technological sovereignty. 

Yet the EU’s ability to influence member states on what security technologies to use remains limited because there is no consensus on technology among member states. This means they make unilateral decisions, and there is no overall strategy on how to secure the EU’s digital space. In contrast, China’s centralised approach to technological sovereignty shows how unified governance can encourage sovereignty of security technologies at scale.

China’s approach to policing tech modernisation

China’s adoption of new technologies in policing is shaped by three key dynamics: a top-down approach to technological development, close collaboration between public institutions and private companies, and a strong emphasis on retaining control and autonomy over the technologies introduced into the public security system.

Top-down innovation

China’s public security agencies prioritise innovation in policing technologies and technology sovereignty across government operations. These aims have been embedded in national strategy since the 1990s, under top-down campaigns promoting ‘informatisation’ and ‘strengthening the police with science and technology’.

Such policies have ensured that innovation remains central to modernising law enforcement. From the 2010s, the focus shifted toward big data through initiatives like smart public security and intelligent policing. In 2012, Shandong province exemplified this shift, with Director Liu Zhimin describing the move from ‘sweat policing to smart policing’. The ‘smart’ initiatives included scanning building QR codes to access resident information and reading vehicle license plates to identify registered drivers.

Public-private collaboration

Back in 2000, China’s Ministry of Public Security hosted its first international trade expo, Security China 2000. While globally contested due to the commercialisation of coercive state surveillance, it was a landmark event that reshaped how China’s public security worked with global tech companies. With over 300 businesses from more than 16 countries in attendance, the expo sent a clear message: China was ready to modernise its public security systems and was looking for help from international firms.

Over the next two decades, China’s party-state actively sourced these technologies from abroad, building up its digital capabilities until domestic companies could take the lead. Once that happened, the government began favouring homegrown tech in its procurement processes. This gave local firms a strategic edge in bids for public security contracts.

In 2016, it was reported that over 60% of security networks were sold directly to public security agencies in China. This figure, while difficult to independently verify, reflects a broader truth widely accepted by scholars: public security spending is a major driver of the country’s tech industry. The close relationship between China’s public security apparatus and its private sector has been a defining feature of the post-Mao era, enabling rapid technological advancement in policing and surveillance. 

These partnerships help modernise China’s security sector. The large, competitive domestic market drives innovation, while strict state oversight ensures technological advances are aligned with government priorities, creating a tech ecosystem that balances control with commercial growth. The result is a technology ecosystem that supports both commercial growth and technological sovereignty.

Retaining control 

Alongside these modernisation efforts, Chinese policing agencies have sought to own platform infrastructure, such as data centres, applications, and maintenance systems. This emphasis on state control of technologies and data contrasts with European approaches, where private enterprise plays a central role in deploying new policing technologies.

My research into Chinese technologies consistently shows that government procurement prioritises control and ownership of surveillance infrastructure, whether in cloud computing or policing systems embedded in social media platforms. This reflects a broader strategy of technological sovereignty, where the state maintains oversight of both the tools and the data they generate. While market-driven innovation helps develop platform-based policing tools, public security bureaus deliberately retain control over the hardware and software behind these systems. This ensures that data flows and system architecture remain under state jurisdiction. 

A key example is Police Cloud, a cloud-based infrastructure used by public security agencies at provincial and national levels. In its pioneering public bidding process for the construction of Police Cloud, Shanxi province co-developed systems with local enterprises and government cloud services that allowed it to retain autonomy and control over the platform.

Lessons for Europe

As digital crime increases and traditional crime declines, law enforcement agencies are under pressure to modernise their capabilities. However, the adoption of data-driven technologies must be critically examined to safeguard ethical oversight, accountability, transparency, and public trust, especially because they raise concerns around privacy, sovereignty, and surveillance.

In China, top-down policy plans create demand for new policing tech. However, new surveillance technologies are not simply introduced as top-down government projects but are rather engaged in a give-and-take dynamic between government and private actors. Planning and investment help motivate private industry to develop new technologies for policing, especially when domestic suppliers are prioritised in the procurement process. The EU could emulate this process.

China’s public security agencies are also strict about maintaining autonomy and control of new technologies as they are adopted in the public security system. Often, this is a requirement specified in procurement documents, no matter how small or large the procurement project is. This is another strategy that European procurement could embrace to start creating a more cohesive security strategy.

To be sure, China’s technological advancement has not been without problems. For instance, cybersecurity has not kept pace with its rapid digitisation – in 2022, a Shanghai police database leak exposed the data of nearly one billion citizens and thousands of facial recognition records from Beijing’s smart security network. Additionally, overt state control of private enterprise has created issues with co-opting private firms to conduct surveillance on behalf of the state.

Yet Europe doesn’t have to – nor should it – adopt China’s approach wholesale. Instead, it can pick and choose whichever aspects of China’s approach have proven to work, like the sustained investment in innovation and ownership of platforms and adapt them for the EU setting in a way compatible with democratic societies.