BEIJING—Explaining that they wanted some nice pictures of everyone for posterity’s sake, officials within China’s Ministry of Public Security asked the entire nation to pose Tuesday while millions of government security cameras took photographs. “Okay, everyone, hold still and give us a smile!” said a booming voice that issued from millions of loudspeakers, commanding tall people to get in the back and the people in front to squat down so the state’s increasingly sophisticated surveillance mechanisms could capture images of the country’s 1.4 billion residents. “We’ll do a few serious ones first and then a silly one. Hey, [Guangzhou resident] Jing Xiang, could you move to the right a bit?” At press time, reports confirmed the state police had escorted away a man who did bunny ears and shipped him off to a reeducation camp.

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