US Feared China’s Trade ‘Superweapon’. Now LOGINK Has All But Disappeared

Four years ago, Washington sounded the alarm over LOGINK, a Chinese state-backed digital platform that US officials feared could become a powerful tool for Beijing to gain visibility into global trade.

The platform was designed to make international shipping more efficient by connecting logistics information from ports, customs agencies, trucking companies and other transport providers. But the global expansion that once appeared to be its biggest strength has now largely stalled.

A Reuters investigation found that LOGINK has lost major international partnerships, withdrawn from a global maritime association and become embroiled in legal disputes in China over unpaid bills.

Its decline was starkly visible in Wenzhou, where the platform’s operations centre is based. When a Reuters reporter visited the facility in September, the building appeared deserted. The reception area was empty, lights were off and computer cables had been removed.

LOGINK did not respond to calls and emails seeking comment. China’s transport ministry also declined to answer questions, although a policy document issued in June called for the platform to be connected to additional domestic data sources.

The reversal is significant because LOGINK was once part of Beijing’s broader push to gain influence over the digital infrastructure supporting global shipping. Maritime transport carries about 80% of world trade, making control over logistics data strategically important.

Washington had argued that LOGINK’s global expansion could give China access to valuable information about international cargo flows, including shipment volumes, prices and traded goods. US officials and security experts also raised concerns that such information could potentially expose sensitive military shipments moving through commercial freight networks.

LOGINK has disputed those concerns. In a 2024 submission to the US Trade Representative, official Li Zhao said the platform did not have the ability to collect sensitive commercial information or continuously monitor global cargo movements.

A US State Department spokesperson nevertheless said Washington would not allow a Beijing-controlled platform to gain a “chokehold over global maritime data”.

HOW LOGINK’S GLOBAL PUSH BEGAN

LOGINK, formally known as the National Transportation and Logistics Public Information Platform, began roughly two decades ago as a local project in Zhejiang province.

Its original goal was to improve the movement of goods by bringing together information from ports, trucks and logistics companies on a single digital platform.

The project eventually attracted attention in Beijing and was brought under China’s transport ministry. From there, its ambitions expanded beyond China’s borders.

In 2010, LOGINK established a data-sharing arrangement with Japan and South Korea, linking the Chinese platform with logistics information systems in the two countries.

It later signed an agreement with a Hong Kong-based logistics platform that LOGINK said would give it access to more than 90% of global ship-tracking data.

A 2015 presentation by China’s transport ministry described the vision of LOGINK becoming a “one-stop portal” connected to logistics information systems around the world.

By the late 2010s, the platform was also seeking partnerships with European ports.

But the expansion increasingly attracted scrutiny in the United States.

In 2022, LOGINK joined an international data-sharing initiative involving digital platforms used to exchange cargo and customs information at ports. A US congressional commission warned that the move could significantly expand LOGINK’s cooperation with international ports.

US lawmakers then stepped up pressure.

A group of Republican lawmakers, including Marco Rubio, urged then-President Joe Biden to take action against LOGINK, warning that unchecked expansion could give Beijing excessive influence over global trade.

In 2023, then-Representative Michelle Steel called on the International Port Community Systems Association to end its relationship with LOGINK.

Congress also barred the Pentagon from entering into contracts with LOGINK-linked entities and instructed US officials to discourage allies and partners from using the platform.

However, officials in Japan and South Korea told Reuters that their data-sharing arrangements with LOGINK were narrower than Washington’s warnings suggested.

Both governments said the information exchanged included vessel arrival and departure times and cargo loading and unloading details, rather than the contents of shipments.

THEN, THE GLOBAL NETWORK STARTED TO DISAPPEAR

LOGINK’s international presence began shrinking soon after.

Its membership of the International Port Community Systems Association ended in 2024 after it stopped paying membership fees, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The association confirmed that LOGINK was no longer a member and said the international data-sharing initiative was itself on hold.

LOGINK’s website also went offline around the same period. The latest version available through the Wayback Machine dates to June 2024.

Its arrangement with Japan and South Korea has also effectively collapsed.

China cancelled a meeting scheduled for March 2024, citing “internal circumstances”, according to South Korea’s oceans ministry. No further meetings have taken place.

Japan later lost access to LOGINK’s data. A Japanese transport ministry official said in August that access had ended more than a year earlier and that Japanese officials had been unable to contact their Chinese counterparts.

LOGINK’s European ambitions produced similarly limited results.

Portugal’s Sines port signed a 2017 memorandum with LOGINK to explore data-sharing, but the arrangement produced no significant results, according to the port authority.

Portbase, the digital system supporting the Port of Rotterdam, signed a memorandum with LOGINK in 2019. That relationship also never moved beyond exploratory discussions.

FROM GLOBAL AMBITIONS TO DOMESTIC LEGAL BATTLES

At home, LOGINK has encountered its own problems.

The commercial entity operating its Wenzhou hub has faced at least 39 court claims since January 2024, with the disputes totalling around $1.3 million, according to Chinese corporate records reviewed by Reuters.

The cases include labour disputes and claims apparently linked to unpaid utilities.

China Mobile is among the claimants. A subsidiary of the telecom giant sued LOGINK in October 2025 over a contract dispute involving service provision. A court later ordered LOGINK to pay, although the available filings do not show whether the payment was made.

The company also appears to be facing a dispute over its premises. In May, a court heard a property lease case brought by the state-backed developer operating the industrial park where LOGINK is based.

Then came the most striking sign of the platform’s decline.

When Reuters visited the Wenzhou facility in September, there was no visible sign of normal operations. The building stood largely empty, with dusty desks and chairs and no apparent staff activity.

Yet one reminder of LOGINK’s original mission remained on the wall: a Communist Party slogan calling for China to “leverage global supply chains” by 2035.

The platform once presented as a potential gateway to global logistics data has instead seen its international network unravel, leaving unanswered questions over what caused one of Beijing’s most ambitious digital trade projects to retreat so dramatically.