The Chinese government has made its drive to become self-sufficient in advanced technology and innovation a key element of its response to the growing competition with the United States. In 2025 has already seen a number of corruption cases involving scientific research. The National Natural Science Foundation of China, the state body in charge of allocating funds for basic research, announced in April that it was investigating 15 misconduct involving 13 universities and 24 individuals. The cases included breaches of review protocols, buying and selling papers, plagiarism and the unauthorised labelling of grant support.

There is also an ongoing major anti-corruption investigation targeting officials responsible for science and technology in Guizhou, a province that has invested heavily in big data. A number of officials have been placed under investigation.

Source https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3318538/chinas-corruption-busters-target-science-sector-crackdown-research-funding-fraud

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