Chinese AI company targeted 2024 Taiwan election and Hong Kong dissent with bot networks
According to documents discovered by Vanderbilt University researchers, GoLaxy, a Chinese AI company founded by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, used generative AI and psychological profiling to target Hong Kong and Taiwan with bot networks and personalized propaganda. The company identified dissidents in Hong Kong and suggested methods to weaken Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party ahead of the 2024 election, while accumulating extensive data on both territories and US political figures.
What happened
According to documents discovered by Vanderbilt University's National Security Institute, GoLaxy, a Chinese company founded in 2010 by a Chinese Academy of Sciences research institute, deployed generative AI and psychological profiling technology against Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The company identified thousands of protest participants and opinion leaders from 180,000 Hong Kong Twitter accounts and used bot networks to "correct" messages it deemed lies and misinformation in order to suppress opposition to the 2020 national security law. Ahead of the 2024 Taiwan election, GoLaxy suggested methods to weaken the Democratic Progressive Party and recommended deploying bot account networks to exploit partisan political divisions.
Reported impact
GoLaxy accumulated extensive data on Taiwan including government organizational charts with political leanings, attitudes toward China and GPS coordinates, as well as personal profiles of over 5,000 Taiwan accounts. Documents suggest the company also collected data on at least 117 US Congress members and over 2,000 US political figures and thought leaders, indicating possible plans for expansion to the United States.
GoLaxy's AI-generated messages are designed to appear realistic and are delivered at unprecedented scale, gradually infiltrating daily digital discussions in ways users may not detect. The technology combines generative AI with mass individual data to build dynamic psychological profiles and generate customized synthetic content in real time.
Index analysis
GoLaxy is connected to China's political system through its founding by a Chinese Academy of Sciences institute, ongoing collaboration with high-level intelligence and party-military departments, and 2021 funding from Sugon, a supercomputing company listed by the Pentagon as affiliated with Chinese military. The company's strategic positioning connects it directly to generative AI systems and China's leading AI models.
The technology weaponizes the openness, transparency and pluralistic debate that underpin democratic societies. As the boundary between surveillance and persuasion erodes, AI-generated content can propagate silently at massive scale without significant resistance, continuously shaping public opinion and corroding democratic institutions in ways larger in scope and more sophisticated than current social media platforms.
Governance controls
GoLaxy denied in a written statement that it provided technological support for activities in Hong Kong and Taiwan, denied developing personalized bot account networks or psychological profiling tools, and denied being affiliated with any government institution or organization.
A GoLaxy representative stated the company's business focus is providing commercial intelligence services and denied collecting data specifically about US officials. The documents discovered did not include specific examples of individual conversations generated by the technology.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.