Twitter's New Director has CCP Ties Deeper Than You Know: Fei-fei Li
On May 11, Twitter announced that it had added former Google VP and A.I. guru Fei-fei Li to its board of directors, because of her “unparalleled expertise in engineering, computer science, and artificial intelligence”. It was reported that Twitter took this action “as it grapples with coronavirus misinformation”.
This news immediately sparked a lot of discussion and concerns, especially among overseas Chinese people, including myself. The main reason is because of Fei-fei Li’s ties with China, or the Chinese Communist Party, the CCP. Some call her “Red Expert”.
Today I’d like to talk about some deeper ties she has with the CCP that many people may not be aware of yet, as well as why we should be very worried.
Background
First, let’s quickly go through her background, as some people may not know that much yet. Fei-fei Li-I’d rather call her Li Fei-fei, as that’s how her name is said in Chinese-was born in China in 1976. She migrated to America with her family when she was 16 and studied physics in Princeton University.
After graduating in 1999, she suddenly returned to China on her own for a year, claiming to be studying Tibetan medicine in Tibet.
Then she returned to the U.S., and pursued her Ph.D. degree at California Institute of Technology, choosing artificial intelligence (AI) and computational neuroscience as her major. She then worked as an assistant professor at the University of Illinois and Princeton University.
In 2009, she started to work at Stanford University, where she was promoted to professor and director of the Stanford AI Lab and Stanford Vision Lab.
While at Stanford, she became known in AI circles for starting ImageNet, the world's largest image recognition database.
Then in January 2017, she joined Google Cloud as its Chief Scientist of AI & Machine Learning, and led Google’s China team with her student Li Jia.
In Oct. 2018, she returned to Stanford.
And recently, as you’ve already known, she was appointed to Twitter’s board.
Mastering the Essence of the CCP’s Tone+Google’s AI Center in China
On Dec. 31, 2017, Google announced the establishment of its Google AI China Center at the “Google Developer Days” in Shanghai.
Li Fei-fei made a 15-minute speech in Chinese.
She says, “Over the past few years, China has demonstrated an incredible capacity for development.”
She quotes Napoleon’s comment and refers to China as a “sleeping lion”.
She says, “In the world of AI, China has long since awakened as one of the world leaders. ... China is also my hometown, I was born here, I grew up here, I have a lot of family and friends who live and work here, my heart is always here."
She then claims with a lot of passion that “The science of AI has no borders. Neither do its benefits.
“AI can change the world. Breakthroughs made anywhere have the potential to make the lives of people in the entire world more wonderful.”
I must say that when I heard her saying so, I wanted very much to say to her, “Sorry, I don’t agree. Just like organ harvesting and transplant technology, in a normal society, it can save people’s lives. But in CCP’s China, it is used to mass murder innocent people so that their organs can be sold. Just as a harmless kitchen knife can also be used to kill if it’s in a murder’s hand. Why would you say that it doesn’t matter who masters the technology? Don’t you know that the Internet, AI, facial recognition have long become tools for the CCP to suppress dissidents? You are not a three-year-old little girl anymore. Why are you so naive?”
When giving an interview to Chinese media on that day about Google’s returning to China, Li Fei-fei used a very famous CCP slogan "stay true to our founding mission". This slogan first appeared in CCP’s 19th National Congress to stress CCP’s legitimacy. By choosing such a term, Li Fei-fei had already shown her gesture.
And her gesture, or stance, did show itself throughout her speech on that day. She adopted CCP’s official narrative of “building a community of common destiny for all mankind.”
I must say that she has mastered the essence of the CCP’s tone, and expressed it quite well.
Many Chinese state media reported about Li Fei-fei’s “returning to her motherland” with much excitement. One report says, “Returning to her motherland again, Ms. Li Fei-fei looks very excited…(再次回到故土，李飞飞女士表现得十分激动)， This time Li Fei-fei officially took Google AI back to our country. (这次李飞飞带着谷歌 AI 中国中心正式归国), “etc.
Cooperation with Military-Backed Project of Tsinghua University
Soon after its establishment, Google AI’s China Center started its cooperation with Tsinghua University.
Xiu Yong (L), Principal of Tsinghua University presenting Jeff Dean(R) with a letter of appointment as a member of the Tsinghua University Computer Science Advisory Committee. (Credit: Official website of Tsinghua University) on June 28, 2018
At the inauguration ceremony of the Tsinghua University’s Artificial Intelligence Institute on June 28, 2018, Jeff Dean, General Director of Google AI, was hired as a member of the Tsinghua University Computer Science Advisory Board. Li Fei-fei and her student Li Jia, were also at the ceremony to congratulate. After the ceremony, the Institute and the Google AI China Center co-hosted the "Tsinghua-Google AI Symposium" with keynote presentations by Jeff Dean, Li Fei-Fei, LI Jia and experts from Tsinghua University.
Li Fei-fei at Tsinghua-Google AI Symposium on June 28, 2018
What’s special about Tsinghua University’s AI project is that it has deep ties with the Chinese military.
In 1990, Tsinghua University established the first "Intelligent Technology and Systems" Lab in China and received more than 100 million yuan’s funding from the Central Military Commission of the CCP.
In June 2017, Tsinghua University established “Civil-Military Integration Cutting-edge Defense Technology Laboratory”, and chose AI as its top priority.
In 2018, Vice-Chancellor of Tsinghua University You Zheng published an article titled "The Road to AI Development through Civil-Military Integration", stating that Tsinghua University would follow the requirement of the CCP, to closely integrate the "National Strategy of Civil-Military Integration" and the "Strategy of Becoming a Powerful Country Via AI Technology", and to ensure that the basic research of AI can effectively support the military applications.
Vice-Chancellor of Tsinghua University You Zheng’s article in Chinese.
The so-called "civil-military integration" is the CCP's strategy of strengthening the military, to provide technical support to the military.
In early Sep. 2018, Capital Online (首都在线), a China-based cloud solution provider, announced in an official WeChat article that Google Cloud had confirmed its cooperation with the company to enter China. However, the company soon withdrew the announcement without reason.
In July 2019, German-American Billionaire investor Peter Thiel accused Google of working with the Chinese military too, and called for the U.S. government to investigate.
On June 28, 2019, the official website of the Chinese Academy of Sciences published an article, saying that a top Chinese scientist in Google's artificial intelligence team had collaborated with researchers in Beijing to develop a "human-computer interaction" project,
Google AI Involving in Developing Cutting-Edge Weapons for the CCP?
In fact, Google AI’s China Center is not the only channel for Google's cooperation with the CCP’s military system.
On June 28, 2019, the official website of the Chinese Academy of Sciences published an article, saying that a top Chinese scientist in Google's artificial intelligence team had collaborated with researchers in Beijing to develop a "human-computer interaction" project, and presented a paper at a top international academic conference.
After the publication of this article, two anonymous Chinese researchers revealed that this technology allows fighter pilots or anti-aircraft missile operators to lock fast-moving targets with unprecedented speed and accuracy on a touch screen and that the J-20, the most advanced stealth fighter aircraft of the CCP, had the opportunity to use it.
Google quickly confirmed that it did have a presence in this study, but denied that it was related to the People’s Liberation Army of the CCP.
Interestingly, the Chinese Academy of Sciences made it clear in this initial version of the press release announcing the results of the study that the study "will have prospects for widespread application in a variety of fields, including military, medical, education and digital entertainment."
However, after Google issued a statement, the mentioning of “military” was removed from the article on the official website of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
But on other Chinese websites, such as the website of Science and Technology Industry Network of the Chinese Academy of Sciences itself, the word “military” is still there.
Western Returned Scholars Association
Li Fei-fei’s deep ties with the CCP can also be traced in her relationship with an important “United Front Work” organizaton of the CCP: the “Western Returned Scholars Association”.
The “Western Returned Scholars Association” was established in 1913 in Beijing by some prominent scholars and intellectuals.
After the CCP came to power in 1949, the association was turned into an important tool for CCP's "United Front Work", and a lot of influential figures in politics, business, and academic circles were all members of this association.
For example, form CCP head Jiang Zemin, Premier Li Peng, Vice-Chairman of CCP's Central Military Commission Liu Huaqing, and Vice Premier Li Lanqing were all once members of this association.
Over a third of the members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and two-thirds of the presidents of Chinese universities are also members.
According to the association's own website, the association is “under the leadership of the General Secretary of CCP’s Central Committee, and the United Front Work Department actually manages the association on behalf of the CCP. (由中共中央书记处领导，中央统战部代管。)
In August 2016, the General Office of the CCP’s Central Committee issued a formal notification regarding how to “strengthen” the Western Returned Scholars Association. The guidelines include strengthening CCP’s leadership over the association, attracting more members, providing venues and ensuring funds, etc.
From all these, we can see clearly that this association is almost under 100% control and direct leadership of the CCP, although it has many overseas members. It can be counted as CCP’s highest level “United Front” organization.
According to the assocation’’s website, on August 19, 2018, the 13th Beijing Forum of the association was held in Beijing. Dai Junling, Deputy Director of CCP’s United Front Work Department, as well as many other prominent United Front Work figures attended this forum. Li Fei-fei and another professor at Standford University, Prof. Zhang Shoucheng also attended that forum.
Zhang Shoucheng was a famous Chinese-American physicist and was once regarded as a potential winner for the Nobel Prize in physics.
In 2017, Li Fei-fei and Zhang Shoucheng were both selected as “top 50 Overseas Chinese Schloars”.
And what’s special about Zhang Shoucheng? It was reported that he was chosen by the CCP when he was only 15 years old, to carry out CCP’s strategy of stealing techonloly from the West.
The venture capital firm “Danhua Capital '' he founded had connections with CCP’s funds, which has been linked to the Chinese technology transfer program Made in China 2025.
In 2018, Danhua Capital was listed as an example of CCP’s venture capital investment in the US by the US government, including the Defense Department.
It was reported that Zhang’s connections to Beijing had drawn attention from the FBI, and “a cloud of suspicion was forming over him”.
Then, on December 1, 2018, Zhang died in what news reports call a suicide. His family said that he died "after fighting a battle with depression.”
But people question whether he really killed himself, or was murdered because he knew too many secrets about CCP’s technology stealing program.
The reason why I spent so much time talking about Zhang Shoucheng is not for the sake of talking about Zhang Shoucheng, but to present the fact that Li Fei-fei was given the same sort of treatment, honor, and attention as that of Zhang Shoucheng by the CCP, the CCP organizations, and CCP’s media. That’s why the two were either invited to the same CCP event or appeared on the same reward list of the CCP.
Future Forum
Apart from the “Western Returned Scholars Association”, Li Fei-fei also has close ties with a very high profile organization, the Future Forum in China. She is a member of the forum’s Science Committee, while Zhang Shoucheng was a founding member of the forum.
Li Fei-fei’s student Li Jia and Zhang Shoucheng’s partner Johnny Zhang are at the Youth Council of the forum.
It is worth noting that the Future Forum is directed by the China Association for Science and Technology and supported by the Beijing Chaoyang District Government, and its strategic media partners include CCP’s most important mouthpieces including People's Daily and Xinhua.
Dozens of most important Chinese IT Giants, as well as sons of top CCP leaders, the so-called “Second-generation Reds” are also members of the forum. For example, Liu Lefei, son of former Chinese Communist Party Politburo Standing Committee member Liu Yunshan, is a council member of the forum. Zhu Yunlai, son of former Prime Minister Zhu Rongji, is a member of the Consultative Committee.
Council member Mary Ma is the Co-founder and Managing Partner of Boyu Capital, which was founded by former CCP head Jiang Zemin’s grandson Jiang Zhicheng.
Li Fei-fei was apparently invited to the Future Science Prize award ceremony and gave speeches more than once. Her group photos with the prominent CCP top elites can still be seen at many Chinese websites.
Li Fei-fei at Future Forum, 2017
Li Fei-fei at Future Forum, 2017
Li Fei-fei at Future Forum.
Li Fei-fei at Future Forum.
Li Fei-fei at Future Forum.
Li Fei-fei with other CCP elites at Future Forum 2017.
Sequoia Capital and Sequoia Professor
In June last year, Stanford University announced that Li Fei-Fei had become its first "Sequoia Professor". The Sequoia Professorship at Stanford University is a chair established by Sequoia Capital. Shen Nanpeng, founder of Sequoia Capital China Fund, also serves on the board of the Future Forum, as does Li Fei-fei.
Sequoia Capital, which once topped the Forbes Global Best Venture Capitalists’ 2018 list, has a track record of co-investing with Boyu Capital on multiple occasions. Sequoia Capital also had a joint stake in Alibaba with Boyu Capital.
From this, we can also see how deep the ties go.
Thousand Talents Program
The Thousand Talents Program established in 2008 by the CCP to identify and to recruit leading international experts in scientific research, innovation, entrepreneurship is now widely recognized as a program to encourage economic espionage and theft of intellectual property. The FBI has long since started to investigate some overseas Chinese experts in the program, and a lot of Chinese websites have deleted articles related to this program.
Up to now, there is no public record showing that Li Fei-fei has joined this program. However, a number of people who have very close relationships with her have very strong ties with the Thousand Talents Program.
For example, at the 2017 Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition held in Hawaii, Li Feifei mentioned a lot of people who had given her support. Among them are Prof. Song-Chun Zhu in UCLA and Prof. Kai Li in Princeton. She also mentioned that her first job at the University of Illinois was given to her by Prof. Thomas Huang , a leading figure in computer vision.
Public record shows that Song-Chun Zhu was chosen as the "Changjiang (Yangtze River) Scholars" Professor in 2009 by the Education Ministry of China, and selected as a special expert for the "Thousand People Program" in 2010.
According to a special interview by China Computer Federation, Prof. Kai Li is also a visiting professor at Tsinghua University, a visiting professor at the Institute of Computing Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a partner, and a researcher of the "Thousand People Program". The PDF file of that interview can still be found, however, many media reports about this interview have already been deleted.
Thomas Huang, who died recently, was elected as a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in 2001 and a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2002.
From April 22 to May 2, 2012, Chongqing Research Institute President Yuan Jiahu came to the United States to solicit talent at Harvard and other 10 colleges and universities. After nine special recruitment seminars, four experts were selected into the “Thousand Talents Program”, 2 were chosen for the “Thousand Youth Talents Plan”, while four scientists including Thomas Huang were appointed as experts of Chongqing Research Institute’s “Strategic Advisory Committee”.
Apart from those, Li Fei-fei’s student Lu Cewu (卢策吾) was also recuited into “Thousand Youth Talents Plan” in 2010.
Lu Cewu is also the executive deputy director of the Joint Lab of Shanghai Jiaotong University and SenseTime, an AI technology company.
CCP’s Teams Win Top Prize at ImageNet’s Competition
In 2016, SenseTime participated in ImageNet ILSVRC2016 (large-scale image recognition competition), which was founded by Li Fei-Fei, and took the first place in three projects.
SenseTime’s founder, Dr. Xu Li, has publicly stated that his company uses a lot of video data from the Guangzhou Public Security System to develop video analysis software, and “we can easily gather the data information we need for any use scenario." He said. "And the biggest source of data is the government."
It is worth noting that the winners of the targeting and scenario classification in this competition were Trimps-Soushen and the HikVision.
For the name “Trimps-Soushen”, Trimps, T-R-I-M-P-S, stands for The Third Research Institute of Ministry of Public Security, or in Chinese 公安部三所. In brief, Trimps is the research institute for advancing the technologies for CCP’s police force.
Soushen should be the team name under Trimps. It means god of search, where Sou (搜) means search and Shen (神) means god.
HikVision is the world's largest surveillance equipment manufacturer and is controlled by CCP. It is known for assisting the CCP in its human rights violations, and US lawmakers are calling for sanctions against it.
So, to put it simply, CCP’s police team and the team of the largest surveillance equipment manufacturer were given top prizes at the ImageNet’s competition, and ImageNet was founded by Li Fei-fei.
Isn’t the connection obvious enough?
Put all the information above together, we can see that Li Fei-fei’s ties with the CCP are really deeper than most of us know. That’s why many overseas Chinese people, especially Twitter users, became very worried upon learning the news that Li was appointed to Twitter’s board.
I Also Have Fear
As a matter of fact, I hesitated a lot whether I should do this program or not, after I learned that a Chinese analyst, Caijinglengyan’s 4 Twitter accounts were all suspended after he did a similar program about Li Fei-fei. I was afraid of losing my 148 K Twitter followers.
So I posted a tweet and asked my followers’ opinions whether I should do this program or not. Most people voted yes, and that gave me the courage to actually do it. Fingers crossed that nothing bad will happen after this. Please pray for me.
Okey, that's all for today. Now I understand more about how hard it is to speak truth to power, even in the free world, which is not that free already. Please support me so that we can fight together to win back our freedom.
Thank you, see you next time.
5/27/2020
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