Mitt Romney says US tech supremacy key to countering authoritarian repression

SALT LAKE CITY — In order to counter authoritarian regimes’ use of technologies such as artificial intelligence for surveillance and other antidemocratic means, Sen. Mitt Romney said the United States needs to remain at the cutting edge of technology rather than relying on diplomacy or sanctions alone.

The Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific and International Cybersecurity Policy convened a hearing on digital authoritarianism Tuesday in Washington, during which subcommittee Chairman Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland, outlined the growing threat some emerging technologies present to human rights — both in authoritarian and in democratic countries.

“The proliferation of AI-enhanced mass surveillance technologies spread by nations like the PRC (People’s Republic of China) and others is accelerating as regimes seek to engage in the mass surveillance of their citizens,” Van Hollen said. “This alarming trend presents significant challenges not only to individual privacy but also to global security, to democratic governance and freedom of expression.”

The chairman added that “tools designed to empower citizens are being weaponized against them and we must take decisive action to counter this trend.” He praised the Biden administration for having taken executive action along those lines by using sanctions, visa restrictions, export controls and diplomatic agreements aimed at curbing abuses of power made possible by new technologies.

While Romney, Utah’s junior Republican senator and ranking member on the subcommittee, agreed with the assessment of the threat, he was doubtful that policies would be able to prevent authoritarian leaders from trying to use repressive technologies.

“I likewise am disturbed by the threat posed by technology, and particularly in the area of cyber intrusion warfare, oversight, spying and so forth,” he said. “I guess it’s no surprise that the systems that are in conflict — free nations versus authoritarian nations — would find that the competition goes beyond air, land and sea, and is now also in cyber. You have to count me, however, as skeptical that there’s something we can do to prevent the bad guys from doing bad things. … I don’t know if there’s any way we can prevent them from doing that, other than by developing tools ourselves that are superior to theirs.”

“To secure the rights we hold dear, free nations must out-compete our adversaries,” Romney tweeted after the hearing. “Superiority in innovation is what America has always done to hold aloft the flame of freedom.”

Authoritarians are taking advantage of advanced technologies like AI to increase their global influence. To secure the rights we hold dear, free nations must out-compete our adversaries. Superiority in innovation is what America has always done to hold aloft the flame of freedom. pic.twitter.com/soH5E8F983

— Senator Mitt Romney (@SenatorRomney) September 24, 2024

Laura Cunningham, the president of the Open Technology Fund, told the subcommittee that regimes are increasingly able to use “repressive technical shortcuts” to control the population through censorship, surveillance and the stifling of opposition groups and journalists. She noted that more than 110 countries have received information technologies from China and Russia, which could be used to expand the reach of authoritarians beyond their own borders.

“Commercial spyware products — which have been acquired by nearly 40% of all nations — have now made it possible to surveil citizens anywhere in the world,” she said.

She added that Open Technology Fund is actively working to counter the use of technology to repress populations by providing technology — such as virtual private networks — to citizens in countries where online information is suppressed.

Romney later said that disinformation and other misleading or harmful content online raise other questions about what it means to have a “free and open internet.”

“I don’t know precisely how you determine that,” he said. “Are we going to censor Russian bots? I think yes, but that is no longer free and open. And how do you define a free and open internet? Because I’m sure (Chinese President) Xi Jinping would say, ‘That’s what we have. We have a free and open internet.’ All the information that people need to see, all the truth as he wants people to see, is there. And we disagree.”

Jamil N. Jaffer, the founder and executive director of the Virginia-based National Security Institute, responded to Romney’s question by making a clear distinction between surveillance and other tools when used by authoritarian regimes and those same tools being used in democratic nations.

“I think the only solution to this challenge and problem that you raised, Sen. Romney, is recognize that there’s not a moral equivalence between what we do and what the Chinese do,” Jaffer said. “When the Chinese or the Russians or the Iranians conduct surveillance, they do it in a one-party state with one control — no judges, no independent authorities. When we conduct surveillance, we’ve got to go through judges … there’s a lot of oversight.”

“It’s not the same,” he added. “We talk about their disinformation versus ours, or our legitimate information versus theirs; there’s a fundamental distinction. … It’s OK to say, ‘No, China, Russia, you can’t get that same thing because you’re an authoritarian society.’ It’s just a different system. It’s OK to say when they do it, it’s different; when we do it, it’s OK.”