Myanmar’s Military Struggles to Control the Virtual Battlefield Crisis Group Asia Report N°314, 18 May 2021 Page 13 Further surveillance initiatives with potentially troubling repercussions were also planned or implemented through what were called “Safe City” projects. In the capital, Naypyitaw, a system of 335 Huawei surveillance cameras with facial recognition and licence plate identification technology went live in December 2020.59 A similar project in Mandalay Region covering three townships was due to come online in mid2021, with Yangon expected to follow later. The system is designed to automatically alert authorities when it detects individuals who are on a wanted list, among other applications.60 In principle, these initiatives could have been of great benefit to Myanmar, harnessing technology to improve governance, administrative efficiency and security. But in the absence of legal safeguards protecting individual privacy and digital rights, they also risked providing the authorities – whether civilian or military – with the tools to monitor, censor and prosecute members of the public, including political opponents, at will. Those who tried to raise concerns about data privacy and digital rights issues with the NLD government or party lawmakers saw their concerns brushed aside. Although many NLD officials had personally experienced abuses at the hands of the military during junta rule, they seemed indifferent to the possibility that their initiatives could be misused by civil servants or the security forces, including against themselves. Few if any foresaw a scenario in which the military came back to power through force. “When the coup happened, the NLD was a sitting duck because of these programs”, said one digital rights advocate. “We had tried to draw their attention to the red flags, but it was like talking to a brick wall”.61 NLD lawmakers and government officials also failed to push back against the military’s proposals to equip the police force with advanced surveillance and monitoring equipment that it is now likely to use against the opposition movement, if it is not already doing so (see Section IV.A below).62 59 “Hundreds of Huawei CCTV cameras with facial recognition go live in Naypyitaw”, Myanmar Now, 15 December 2020. 60 “Myanmar: Facial Recognition System Threatens Rights”, Human Rights Watch, 12 March 2021. 61 Crisis Group interviews, January and March 2021. 62 Crisis Group interviews, social media researchers and digital rights advocates, March 2021. See also “Myanmar’s military deploys digital arsenal of repression in crackdown”, The New York Times, 1 March 2021.