House Majority Leader Steve Scalise is sounding the alarm about the threat of Chinese humanoid robots arriving in America and jeopardizing national security.
The Louisiana Republican shared his concern about Chinese communist robots in an address to the Reindustrialize Conference in Detroit this week, where he detailed the national security threat posed by imported robots.
“It sounds like sci-fi, but humanoid robots are real and very concerning coming from China,” Mr. Scalise said. “It’s the latest in many examples of national security threats coming from technology with ties to China.”
Chinese robots potentially flooding the American market pose a grave danger to all Americans, according to Jacob Helberg, a leader of the congressionally chartered U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission.
Mr. Helberg told the conference that concerns about surveillance from the China-founded TikTok pale in comparison to what communist robots could potentially do.
“These robots will be a stealth army on our land that the Chinese Communist Party can activate against us at any moment’s notice,” Mr. Helberg said. “We can’t allow this reality.”
Once activated, the communist robot army will spy for Beijing wherever they can, according to Mr. Helberg.
“Chinese humanoid robots have the potential to be a Trojan horse in every American warehouse, factory floor and home,” Mr. Helberg said. “We’d have to be delusional or suicidal to allow this to happen.”
Mr. Helberg is an advisor to the major software company Palantir, which invests in robotics and wants to create a new “ecosystem of tech patriots.”
Concerns about Chinese cyberespionage and internet-connected devices are not limited to AI-powered humanoid robots or the exclusive fears of tech investors, however.
America’s growing list of internet-connected devices have made the internet-of-things (IoT) a major subject of concern for those worried about state-sponsored hacking and surveillance.
In 2022, researcher Christopher Balding reported that problems with internet-connected coffee machines were part of a broader data-collection effort from China employing IoT devices.
He identified the machines’ gathering of product information, payment data and relative location and time data could expose customers’ sensitive information to prying eyes. The level of exposure of information varies depending on the machines’ use, such as in a hotel’s breakfast buffet versus an at-home coffee maker.
In 2020, Singapore researchers said they discovered hackers could breach robot vacuum cleaners and re-purpose light detection and ranging sensors for navigation into laser-based microphones to record unsuspecting people.
“When your robot vacuum cleaner does its work around the house, beware that it could pick up private conversations along with the dust and dirt,” the National University of Singapore warned.
To combat a China-backed takeover of robotics at use in America, Mr. Helberg wants Congress to tilt the economic playing field in favor of American robot-makers. U.S. officials, he said, should enact new restrictions on the sale and distribution of Chinese humanoid robots, in a manner similar to lawmakers’ crackdown on TikTok, to give freedom-loving robots a chance at survival.
“The Chinese government is racing to flood this market with subsidized humanoids that only cost $16,000 dollars apiece, roughly one-fifth of the cost of the average American humanoid,” Mr. Helberg said at the conference. “Without policy action from Washington, China is poised to quickly put American competitors out of business and make Americans reliant on [China]-controlled humanoid robots.”
