China's Commerce Ministry: US 'distillation crackdown' just a pretext to monopolize AI

China's Ministry of Commerce has hit back at US criticism accusing Chinese AI companies of trying to catch up with American firms through a technique known as "distillation." The ministry said the accusation is merely a pretext for Washington's attempt to monopolize the AI industry.

A Ministry of Commerce spokesperson made the remarks in a Wednesday Q&A session with reporters, according to a statement posted on the ministry's website Thursday (local time). "The US is politicizing and weaponizing what are normal technological and commercial issues within the industry," the spokesperson said.

Distillation refers to a technique in which developers feed another AI model's outputs into their own model to retrain it. US authorities have previously said Chinese companies have been infringing on American firms' intellectual property rights through industrial-scale distillation.

"The US announcement is yet another clear piece of evidence of its pursuit of technological hegemony in the AI field, its bid to monopolize computing power and its suppression of competition," the ministry said. "China firmly opposes this."

"Distillation is a common method in the AI field in which models learn from one another," the ministry added. "It is essentially a neutral technology used by AI model companies worldwide, including US firms. (The US criticism) is a textbook case of double standards."

The ministry argued that China has used an open-source approach to make its technology available to the world, while US companies themselves distill Chinese models on a large scale. Yet the United States has unilaterally criticized and attacked Chinese firms, it said.

"The US approach is a typical case of using a crackdown on distillation as a pretext while, in practice, trying to monopolize the industry," the ministry said. It added that Washington "mobilizes state power organs to interfere with normal business activities."

The ministry also warned, "If the US tries to suppress Chinese companies under the pretext of cracking down on distillation, China will respond with firm countermeasures."

Mao Ning, spokesperson for China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, also said Wednesday, "China's AI development is the result of a high degree of scientific and technological self-reliance." She added, "We hope (the US) will refrain from making unfounded accusations and smearing China."

Liu Wei is director of the Human-Machine Interaction and Cognitive Engineering Laboratory at Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications. He told the Global Times that the United States habitually conflates commercial and technological competition with national security in order to justify additional sanctions.