In China, the business of assessing the "social trustworthiness" of private citizens is growing rapidly. An individual's social credit score will decrease if he or she is late in returning a rented bicycle, spends too much time playing computer games, watches pornography, drives under the influence of alcohol or misses loan repayments. A low social credit score could lead to rejection of a bicycle lease contract or denial of a travel permit to Singapore, and could also carry negative implications for employment, job changes and even marriage prospects.

The Alibaba-affiliated Ant Financial Services Group is one of several companies that has expanded into this new field of social credit with its Sesame Credit system. These companies examine individuals' academic background and employment history, assets such as cars, homes and other items, payment history, social relationships and consumption patterns, and transform this into a numerical representation of his or her "trustworthiness" scored between 350 and 950 points. Individuals are informed of their social credit score. Given the advantages conferred by a high social credit score, hundreds of millions of Chinese have reportedly supplied their personal information in order to increase their social credit rating.

The Chinese Communist Party is also promoting the concept of social credit, because "making trustworthiness visible" can be leveraged to create a docile populace and stabilize the current political system. For example, 200 points are immediately deducted from the social credit score of anyone who makes a comment critical of the Chinese government on a blog related to the Tiananmen Square incident of 1989.