May 27, 2022
A bill introduced by Republican senators would ban U.S. app stores from hosting apps that accept China’s digital yuan.
The bill sponsored by Senators Tom Cotton, Marco Rubio and Mike Braun, states that companies that own or control app stores “shall not carry or support any app in (their) app store(s) within the United States that supports or enables transactions in e-CNY.”
In recent years, the U.S. government has been able to draft laws restricting the use of Chinese technology products and services, based on the notion that these products pose security threats to the country, because they could be used for surveillance.
Defending the bill to ban China’s digital yuan, Cotton’s office said that the digital yuan could provide the Chinese government with “real-time visibility into all transactions on the network, posing privacy and security concerns for American persons who join this network.”
The lawmakers’ opinion complements a January 2021 report by the Center for a New American Security that said China’s digital currency and electronic payment system will likely be a boon to the CCP’s economic surveillance and state interference in the lives of Chinese citizens.
The sources for this piece include a story in Reuters.
