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China's ambitious plans to develop a far-reaching social credit system by collecting information online

China wants to give all of its citizens a score and their rating could affect every area of their lives.

5 The Communist Party wants to encourage good behaviour by marking all its people using online data. Those who fall short will be denied basic freedoms like loans or travel

Imagine a world where an authoritarian government monitors everything you do, amasses huge amounts of data on almost every interaction you make, and awards you a single score that measures how "trustworthy" you are.

10 In this world, anything from defaulting on a loan to criticising the ruling party, from running a red light to failing to care for your parents properly, could cause you to lose points. And in this world, your score becomes the ultimate truth of who you are determining whether you can borrow money, get your children into the best schools or travel abroad; whether you get a room in a fancy hotel, a seat in a top restaurant or even just get a date.

15 This is not the dystopian superstate of Steven Spielberg's Minority Report, in which all- knowing police stop crime before it happens. But it could be China by 2020. It is the scenario contained in China's ambitious plans to develop a far-reaching social credit system, a plan that the Communist Party hopes will build a culture of "sincerity" and a "harmonious. socialist society" where "keeping trust is glorious."

20 A high-level policy document released in September listed the sanctions that could be imposed on any person or company deemed to have fallen short. The overriding principle: "If trust is broken in one place, restrictions are imposed everywhere." A whole range of privileges would be denied, while people and companies breaking social trust would also be subject to expanded daily supervision and random inspections.

25 The ambition is to collect every scran of information available online about China's companies and citizens in a single place and then assign each of them a score based on their political, commercial, social and legal "credit."

The government hasn't announced exactly how the plan will work for example, how scores will be compiled and different qualities weighted against one another. But the idea is that 30 good behaviour will be rewarded and bad behaviour punished, with the Communist Party acting as the ultimate judge. This is what China calls "Internet Plus," but crities call a 21st- century police state.

Harnessing the power of big data and the ubiquity of smartphones, ecommerce and social media in a society where 700 million people live large parts of their lives online, the plan will 35 also vacuum up court, police, banking, tax and employment records. Doctors, teachers, local governments and businesses could additionally be scored by citizens for their professionalism and probity.

"China is moving towards a totalitarian society, where the government controls and affects

individuals' private lives," said Beijing-based novelist and social commentator Murong

40 Xuecun. "This is like Big Brother, who has all your information and can harm you in any way

he wants.

What is China's objective? Explain it in your own words in one or two lines.