US-based Uighur activist Tahir Imin pointed out how a lack of regulation has led to breaches of privacy and technology being used for mass surveillance.
Imin said that advanced tech companies, including US ones, helped China harvest data that was used for the surveillance and arrest of Uighurs.
“It’s a terrible feeling when a helpless people face a regime which is backed by the most advanced technology,” he said.
Imin believes it is important to note that some Western tech companies have “successfully pretended to be defenders of human rights and data privacy rights in the West” – while at the same time they “cooperated with authoritarian regimes like China”.
In the past year, Chinese authorities have come under criticism for applying facial recognition technology, particularly for identifying the members of the Uighur Muslim minority in Xinjiang province.
According to some estimates, up to a million Uighurs were moved to internment camps after they were racially profiled in Xinjiang and in other provinces.
“I, along with millions of other Uighurs, was forced by Chinese authorities to draw my blood, my face scanned, my voice recorded without knowing why and how they will use it,” Imin told Al Jazeera.
Nevertheless, despite his criticism of tech organisations, Imin said he was also optimistic about the future of technology which, he said, has also helped him to convey the voice of his people to audiences around the world to raise awareness around the issues of the Uighur minority in China.
