Advanced Chinese-made robots with life-threatening capabilities are poised to hit the global market — and some American lawmakers are already calling for them to be banned in the U.S., The Post has learned.
Although not yet widely publicized, various Chinese companies have begun producing humanoid robots that are capable of carrying boxes, moving at high speeds, and even replicating human facial expressions.
A leading Chinese firm, Unitree Robotics, has developed a $90,000 robot capable of running at speeds of up to 11 mph. A cheaper $16,000 version can absorb punches and kicks and swing a bat. Many other firms have similar products in development.
Jacob Helberg — a member of the influential US-China Economic and Security Review Commission who played a key role in persuading Congress to pass a law this spring to force a sale or ban on TikTok — is one of the loudest voices. which warns Congress that it risks disaster if it allows the sale of robots made by firms belonging to Beijing.
Helberg said advances in humanoid technology have occurred “at breakneck speed.”
“I think we’re 12 months away from a ChatGPT moment where the world goes from sleep to wake on this issue,” he added.
As they become more advanced, the Chinese Communist Party or state-sponsored bad actors could use the robots — currently marketed as harmless home helpers and super-efficient assembly line workers — to wreak havoc by spying, sabotage critical infrastructure or worse. scenarios, even physically harming Americans, according to Helberg.
“They can strangle someone in their sleep,” Helberg told The Post. “They can hit a data center and cause physical damage and property destruction.
“After all, if TikTok was a Chinese spy balloon in your pocket, Chinese drones on American soil are poised to be China’s secret PLA army on our soil,” Helberg added. “And we cannot allow that to happen.”
In June, Helberg, a member of the influential U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Committee, appeared at an event alongside House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) — who said the threat of presented by humanoid robots made in China entering the US market was “real and very disturbing”.
Some experts see the warning as far-fetched or even silly. Paul Rosenzweig, a former deputy assistant secretary of Homeland Security, said the dreaded humanoid robots “are a long way off.”
“There are a lot of things in China to worry about, like our competition in AI and their access to American technology and data…But these kinds of things are just a distraction from much more important problems,” Rosenzweig said.
However, Helberg and several lawmakers — including Scalise, the chair of the House Select Committee on China, Rep. John Moolenaar (R-Mich.) and Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.) – believes the US is running out of time to address the problem.
The Chinese government has called for mass production of humanoid robots by 2025 and world-class performance by 2027, according to a widely circulated document released last fall. They have cast their ambitions as a race against American firms such as Boston Dynamics and Elon Musk’s Tesla.
China’s state-run Global Times recently claimed that Chinese robotics firms were “quickly catching up with global rivals” and pointed to a recent event in which Tesla’s Optimus appeared alongside “a group of 18 robots humanoids designed by Chinese manufacturers”.
According to Moolenaar, the danger posed by Chinese-made robots “is not science fiction”.
“In fact, they are part of the same playbook that the Chinese government has run time and time again: subsidize a strategic industry, flood foreign markets with predatory pricing to eliminate competition, and then use this newfound dominance to advance its interests of the Chinese Communist Party,” Moolenaar said in a statement.
“From heavy manufacturing to the military, advanced robotics will play a critical role in the future of our economy and our national security. We need to act on this problem now before it’s too late,” he added.
In the past, concerns that the Chinese Communist Party exploits seemingly harmless technology to its advantage have led Congress to blacklist Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei and pass a bill requiring Beijing-based ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a total ban.
Britt told The Post that he is “working on a legislative fix before any of today’s nightmare scenarios become reality tomorrow.”
“Given that the FBI already opens a new counterintelligence case against China twice a day, that number is sure to rise drastically if the CCP is allowed to send humanoid robots into our country’s interior,” Britt added.
As The Post has reported, lawmakers worry that China or other foreign actors could exploit vulnerabilities in Internet-connected “smart” devices that are now commonplace in American households.
Drones and other forms of automated warfare are playing larger roles on modern battlefields and have been used extensively in the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Hamas war.
During his June 25 appearance alongside Helberg at the Reindustrialization Conference in Detroit, Scalise compared the security risks posed by robots made in China to those that prompted Congress to take action against Huawei and TikTok.
“Without political action from Washington, China is poised to quickly put American competitors out of business and make Americans reliant on CCP-controlled humanoid robots…We must be delusional or suicidal to allow this to happen happen,” Scalise said.
Elsewhere, humanoids produced by Figure, a startup backed by ChatGPT creator OpenAI, have been put to work on the assembly line of automaker BMW.
Musk, who is known for making bold statements about his businesses, claimed earlier this year that Optimus could push Tesla’s market cap to $25 trillion over time.
The billionaire recently said Tesla will have “genuinely useful” humanoids ready for internal use by next year and for sale to other companies by 2026.
Musk has also predicted that there will eventually be 20 billion humanoid robots – although he warned that we “have to be careful that they don’t go all Terminator on us”.
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