As of January 6, the following search terms are blocked on Sina Weibo (not including the “search for user” function).
Each individual character in “Southern Weekly” was blocked as of January 6:
– south (南): nán
– place (方): fāng
– week (周): zhōu
– end (末): mò
Although these characters are unblocked as of posting, “southern” (南方) and “weekend” (周末) remain unsearchable.
In addition, these terms are also blocked:
– nf + zm
– nanfang
– read and understand China (读懂中国): Southern Weekly’s motto is “Here, read and understand China” (在这里,读懂中国)
– China dream (中国梦): The title of the original Southern Weekly editorial was “China’s Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism” (中国梦 宪政梦).
– constitutional government (宪政): Also translated as “constitutionalism.”
– censor (审查)
– propaganda department (宣传部)
– Central Propaganda [Department] (中宣)
– violate the constitution (违宪)
– dedication message (献词)
– message of greeting (贺词)
See also Sensitive Words updates from January 3 and January 4.
All Chinese-language words are tested using simplified characters. The same terms in traditional characters occasionally return different results.
Browse all of CDT’s collected sensitive words in this bilingual Google spreadsheet.
CDT Chinese runs a project that crowd-sources filtered keywords on Sina Weibo search. CDT independently tests the keywords before posting them, but some searches later become accessible again. We welcome readers to contribute to this project so that we can include the most up-to-date information. To add words, check out the form at the bottom of CDT Chinese’s latest sensitive words post.