Fredrik Bergman ran into a problem when a client in Sweden tried to transfer files to his firm’s headquarters here: Each time, the firm lost its Web connection for an hour or so.

After several weeks of multiple outages a day, he says, the firm solved the puzzle: the files were named for the Swedish town of Falun, where the client was working. Mr. Bergman says his firm thinks the name triggered the filters China’s online censors use to block discussion of Falun Gong, a religious group long banned in China.

[…] The American Chamber of Commerce in China said last year that nearly three-quarters of about 300 businesses it surveyed said unstable Internet access impedes their efficiency. About 40% said China’s censorship efforts have a negative business impact.

[…] “The real question is whether the next administration is going to continue to roll back Internet availability to foreign firms,” [Shaun] Rein said. He said companies are unlikely to pull out of China in any case, but they likely will think twice about moves like shifting their regional headquarters to Beijing from places like Singapore and Hong Kong. “They will still invest in China,” he said. “It just depends on what scale.”

Though one China-based entrepreneur tells Mozur and Tejada that homegrown web companies have benefited from shelter against international competition, the overall cost of Internet controls on Chinese firms is likely to be even higher. From Andy Yee at openDemocracy:

This censorship regime is hurting China’s competitiveness in the internet age. Very often, it is commercial firms that bear the collateral damages. Online portals are frustrated about the energy and time wasted on outsourced censorship tasks from the propaganda department. Chinese web giant Tencent has to work hard to deal with censorship concerns connected with its globally popular chat app WeChat among international users, who are accustomed to sharing information freely. Chinese telecom giants Huawei and ZTE, flagged by the US Congress as security threats on flimsy evidence, are victims of China’s perceived opacity. And investor uncertainty about censorship and over-regulation mean that market performance of Chinese internet companies will never achieve their potential.

More importantly, to the extent that web technologies become essential platforms for learning, collaboration and innovation, China runs serious risks of underachieving its information technology ambitions. Chinese talents are robbed of learning possibilities simply because many foreign websites and tools are blocked. According to a UNESCO report, some open educational resources are out of reach for students and educators in China because they are filtered by the Great Firewall.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: business, education, Falun Gong, foreign businesses, huawei, Internet blocking, Internet censorship, Internet crackdown, Internet regulation, online education, tencent, ZTE
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With real name registration, the devolution of responsibility extends beyond the website operators and reaches individual users. When each Weibo post becomes tied to an identified person, then each individual user will be more likely to practice self-censorship with respect to their own posts.

Even without real name registration for user generated content websites, true anonymity on China’s internet does not exist for most users. When registering for home or business internet access, real name registration is already required. Seventy percent of mobile phone users also register with their real names according to China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and the new rules suggest that the anonymous prepaid mobile phone cards will be phased out. Internet cafés are also required to record the real identity of each user. As a result, unless someone posting on Weibo is being very careful, the government already has the means to identify the author of an unwanted post. The six people arrested in connection with spreading rumors of a coup attempt in the spring of 2012 discovered this fact the hard way.

To achieve self-censorship, however, the users must first understand that they can and will be held accountable for the content they post. As a result, it would not be surprising to see implementation of real name registration accompanied by publicity campaigns and a number of high profile prosecutions for posting illegal content.

[...] This new rules were issued by the standing committee of the National People’s Congress, which has a higher position in the official government structure than both the municipality of Beijing and the General Administration of Press and Publication. As a result, the issuance of these rules suggests not only that China’s leadership at the highest levels support the rules, but that those same top leaders are paying attention to the issue of anonyms Weibo posts. With such high level focus, China’s internet users should expect a much greater effort to fully implementation real name registration this time.

Despite the official claims that the new rules will better protect online privacy, Adam Minter at Bloomberg sees Chinese netizens chafe at the real-name registration:

Other, more literary-minded microbloggers have taken to pointing out that many of China’s revolutionary heroes used pseudonyms. Thus, Xi’an Dragon, the online handle of a Sina Weibo microblogger in Xi’an, invokes the seminal 20th Century Chinese writer Lu Xun, a favorite of modern China’s founding father, Chairman Mao:

“If Lu Xun and Mao Zedong were still alive, I’d ask their opinion of real name registration. After all, Lu Xun had many pen names and Mao Zedong also published many articles under many names in many newspapers. Internet real-name registration will become the darkest political scandal in human history: the Real- Name Registration Scandal.”

However, by far the most common criticism of the real-name requirement is that China’s civil servants are asking for ever- greater degrees of transparency from China’s Internet users without requiring it of themselves. Indeed, in the last two years, Chinese governments at various levels have required “real name” registration for kitchen knives, railway tickets and HIV testing, among other things. Meanwhile, a long-promised and very popular proposed civil service reform that would require personal financial disclosures keeps getting punted into the future. For the online opposition to China’s new Internet law, the two issues are directly connected, and it’s not difficult to find microblogs and blogs making the connection. A New Year’s Eve tweet from another pseudonymous microblogger — this time in Zhengzhou — is harshly representative:

“A population of 1.4 billion needs to file a real name registration to buy a kitchen knife. Airlines and railways transported 2,000,000,000 passengers who revealed their real names. But 10,000,000 working civil servants cannot disclose their personal property? It’s not impossible, but they just don’t want to do it. If it’s legitimate income why can’t they accept public supervision?”

See more on real-name registration via CDT.

© Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet activism, Internet censorship, Internet privacy, Internet regulation, privacy, real name registration
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Artist: BrickWeave

New Internet regulations, announced by state media in the final days of 2012, threaten to stifle the vibrant world of the Chinese netizenry. The regulations, which include required real-name registration for all Internet users, were announced in a December 18 People’s Daily editorial, which was in turn covered by CCTV’s primetime news show, News Simulcast (新闻联播 Xīnwén Liánbō). Twisting the CCTV report, BrickWeave casts disgraced politician Lei Zhengfu as the News Simulcast anchor in the mock segment “Netizens Call for Legislation to Protect Online Information.” Ordinary people have exposed corrupt officials like Lei through Weibo, forcing the authorities to do more firing and apologizing than they could have imagined before microblogging began.

Artist: Simon

“Don’t… don’t! I just want to write a weibo…” What exactly does real-name registration mean for Chinese Internet users? Officials say people will still be able to use nicknames online, but that offers little protection from identity theft. South Korea provides a sobering example of who mosts benefits from an online real-name registration system. The ninja inspectors going through this man’s pockets could be government regulators–or cyber-criminals.

Artist: Tango

Be careful what you wish for. A netizen-turned-puppet asks for a little freedom, but the very tool which could liberate him is used to control him instead.

Artist: Yuanzi

In “Getting Rich Through Hard Work” (劳动致富), ordinary men fish for their fair share–but the official, sitting on his throne at the tip of the iceberg, has cast his lines with something else in mind. The online public boiled with rage last year at the luxury watches, designer suits, and Italian cars sported by officials at all levels of the government food chain. Bo Xilai’s humble US$1600 monthly salary was apparently more than enough to send his son to Harrow and Oxford. “Watch Brother” was identified wearing at least 11 different watches in various photos. Guangzhou official Cai Bin was caught owning 21 houses, 20 more than the legal limit. The list goes on.

Artist: Fenzi

This menacing Pinocchio is not ashamed of the florid lie sprouting from his nose. Like a propaganda poster from the Great Leap Forward, it glorifies a bounty that never existed. Retired journalist Yang Jisheng has just published Tombstone: The Great Chinese Famine, the fruit of 20 years of research about the horrors of the Great Famine of 1960-1962. In Foreign Policy, Murong Xuecun writes that the crucial debate in China today is not how the famine happened, but whether it happened at all. He references Frank Dikötter’s landmark book Mao’s Great Famine, which estimates “‘at least’ 45 million premature deaths.” But, says Murong, “the people who spoke the truth are all dead.” Dikötter also examines the country’s collective amnesia in Foreign Policy.

Artist: Padme

What does the New Year have in store for China? Will the Party hold the country together, or will an explosive situation of its own making finally burst forth? The first controversy of 2013 has already charged ahead, as Southern Weekly’s editorial calling on China to uphold its constitution was torn to shreds by the censors. Some people like Eric X. Li may argue that the “China model” offers an alternative success story to democratization, but as China’s economy slows and middle-class discontent grows, it’s clear the whole story has yet to be told.

Browse CDT Chinese’s cartoon collection on Google+.

© Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Drawing the News, famine, Frank Dikötter, great leap forward, history, Internet censorship, Internet regulation, lei zhengfu, Murong Xuecun, News Simulcast, official corruption, political cartoons, political humor, real name registration, Yang Jisheng
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The rules had been heralded by a series of editorials in state media, including one from People’s Daily Online which framed the issue of internet regulation in terms of rule of law. From David Bandurski’s translation at China Media Project:

The internet is public space, and public order and good customs require the common efforts of web users, demanding that each web users “purify themselves” (自我净化), recognizing from the bottom of their hearts that the internet is not a utopia where they can do as they please, that it is not a “Garden of Peaches of Immortality” [i.e., a paradise] existing outside the law. But on this massive platform comprising 538 million web users and more than a billion mobile users, it is impossible byrelying on self-discipline alone to achieve regulation and order (规范有序) and to eliminate every single person with ulterior motives (别有用心者) or every doer of mischief (恶作剧者).

Without wings, the bird of freedom cannot fly high. Without rule of law, a free internet cannot go far. Today’s society reveres rule of law, and just as our actual society needs rule of law, so does our virtual society need rule of law. Cleaning up the online world demands the self-discipline of web users, but even more it demands the interventionist discipline (他律) of rule of law. Only by putting the “binds” of rule of law on the internet, by stipulating the lines of conduct and adding supervision according to the law (厘定行为边界，依法加以监管), only by making violators of the law bear the burden of illegality [as opposed to victims of crimes], only then can we possibly restrain irresponsible rumors, restrain the leakage of personal information, and make the internet clean again.

Following the Standing Committee’s decision, state media have emphasised provisions to protect privacy, and denied that the rules are aimed at suppressing netizens’ celebrated exposure of official wrongdoing. From Gui Tao and Huang Xin at Xinhua:

Online muckraking is not necessarily incompatible with a requirement to provide genuine identification. Many whistleblowers prefer to use their real names, as they feel this will give their claims more weight.

Other reports state that the identity policy will clamp down on the freedom of speech in Chinese cyberspace. But the accusers should know that freedom without limits or responsibility is chaotic and dangerous. No one should enjoy the freedom to spread malicious rumors or libel, even online. The rule should only be feared by slanderers who wish to take advantage of online anonymity.

For law-abiding netizens, the rules passed on Friday will only better safeguard their lawful rights and privacy. The rules, which stress the protection of Internet users’ privacy, stipulate that citizens have the rights to demand service providers to delete online information that discloses their identities or infringes upon their own rights.

[…] Instead of depriving netizens’ freedom and entitlement, the rules protect the legal rights of every Internet user. The rules will ultimately help to create a better online environment in China.

Global Times aimed for a similarly reassuring tone:

Overall, the Chinese Internet is free and responsible, but also has moments of chaos and illegal activity. Infringements upon people’s rights and privacy can easily be found on the Internet. The new legislation, in this regard, is likely to become a turning point in terms of online regulation. Most of its 12 articles respond to the high expectations of the public for changes to the Chinese Internet.

Of course, there are concerns. Despite its chaotic nature, the Internet has been playing a role as a supervisor of the government from the bottom up. As a truly effective and tough supervision mechanism has yet to be formed within the system, supervision from the Internet is important to make up for it. This is a huge contribution the Internet has made to China’s construction of democracy, and no one wants to see it weakened.

In reality, there is no crackdown on the public’s supervision via the Internet, because this wouldn’t help China’s progress.

But meanwhile, we cannot simply cover up all the problems of the Internet just because it dares to criticize. There is urgent need for the Internet to have order, and this cannot be achieved through moral self-discipline only, but requires assistance from the law.

Xinhua’s Gui and Huang also played down the significance of the new real-name rules, arguing that many such requirements already exist. But according to The New York Times’ Keith Bradsher, they are now likely to become both more widespread and more strictly enforced.

Any entity providing Internet access, including over fixed-line or mobile phones, “should when signing agreements with users or confirming provision of services, demand that users provide true information about their identities,” the committee ordered.

[…] The regulations issued Friday build on a series of similar administrative guidelines and municipal rules issued over the past year. China’s mostly private Internet service providers have been slow to comply with them, fearing the reactions of their customers. The committee’s decision has much greater legal force, and puts far more pressure on Chinese Internet providers to comply more quickly and more comprehensively, Internet specialists said.

[…] The requirement for real names appeared to be aimed particularly at cellphone companies and other providers of mobile Internet access. At the news conference, an official from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Zhao Zhiguo, said that nearly all fixed-line services now had real-name registration, but that only about 70 percent of mobile phones were registered under real names.

Whether or not the new rules stem the flow of online exposés, argued NPR’s Frank Langfitt, “it’s also clear that muckrakers can only aim so high.”

LANGFITT: […] Luo Changping is deputy editor of Caijing, one of China’s more aggressive and independent magazines. Earlier this month, he posted on his Chinese Twitter account allegations about a high-ranking official in Beijing. Luo said the official had fabricated his masters’ degree and helped defraud Chinese banks. So far, Luo says, the charges have gone nowhere. […] Many domestic media are not allowed to report on this case, he said, and frankly, Luo was hesitant to discuss it.

CHANGPING: (Through translator) My phones certainly have been monitored, including my office phone, home phone and cell phone. I can feel that. Sometimes phones will be cut off, and you can hear echoes.

LANGFITT: Luo says without the rule of law and a truly open press, piecemeal exposes can only do so much. He’s not optimistic. […] If there are no systematic changes, he says, I think fighting corruption on a case-by-case basis doesn’t have much effect. It’s really just a power struggle between officials.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet activism, Internet regulation, National People's Congress, people's daily, privacy, real name, real name registration, rule of law, state media, Xinhua
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This October, China’s Eighteenth National Congress ushered in a new generation of leaders that will set the agenda for the second-largest economy in the world, provoking myriad questions about what we’ll see out of the country in the coming year. CFR’s Adam Segal predicts continued international concern for China’s cyber policy, while CFR’s Elizabeth C. Economy weighs its challenges of keeping “foreign policy front and center” against a heavy list of domestic concerns. Claremont McKenna’s Minxin Pei adds that China will be forced to respond to calls for greater political openness, facing a delicate balancing act. CFR’s Yanzhong Huang points out that despite China’s highly publicized health-care achievements, reform hasn’t fundamentally solved the problem of access and affordability.

Since Xi Jinping took the reins as CCP general secretary, domestic policy has been front and center: we have seen a symbolic trip to the south emphasize the leader’s commitment to economic reform, and have heard the powerful princeling identify the eradication of party corruption as a major policy goal. Also in question are the prospects for political reform – potentially divisive as the influence of previous party leadership lingers. A reform-minded new leader and an anti-corruption campaign both made Sinocism curator Bill Bishop’s list of “8 Trends to Keep an Eye On” in 2013, published at the NY Times’ Dealbook blog:

NEW LEADER Xi Jinping has moved quickly in his first three weeks to project an image of change. The government faces a growing expectations gap with its citizens and needs to rebuild public confidence. Mr. Xi is talking a lot about the Chinese dream and the “great renewal of the Chinese nation” — nationalist concepts with significant appeal. Mr. Xi’s choice of Shenzhen for his first domestic inspection trip is a symbolic tribute to Deng Xiaoping’s 1992 southern tour that restarted reforms after 1989. Mr. Xi’s visit is most likely a signal that he is serious about pushing forward with changes. Expect renewed energy around overhauls, primarily economic and administrative but possibly some political ones.

CRACKDOWN ON CORRUPTION The new leadership has begun a public crackdown on corruption. One relatively senior official and several minor officials have already fallen. Internet exposés brought down the minor officials, but there are reports that the Communist Party’s central disciplinary inspection commission has started new investigations into money laundering through Macau. Expect this antigraft campaign to ensnare more senior officials and to be the most effective in recent memory, yet ultimately stop short of addressing the systemic issues that have allowed corruption to flourish.

There are those, including CFR’s Elizabeth C. Economy and Bill Bishop above, who stress the importance of China’s foreign policy in the year to come. CNBC talked to Daniel Franklin, editor of The Economist’s “The World in 2013“:

The relationship between China’s new leader Xi Jinping and President Barack Obama “is absolutely the crucial one now for global politics,” Franklin tells The Daily Ticker.

Franklin says both men need to keep U.S.-China trade flowing. China is the second largest trading partner of the U.S. Last year $503 billion worth of goods were exchanged between the two countries. 80% of those items were U.S. imports from China.

Franklin says both countries also need to work on resolving disputes between China and other countries over ownership of islands in the South China Sea. Many of those countries, including Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines, are allies of the U.S.

“This is something that has to be handled, adjusted to, and it will be awkward, no doubt about it,” says Franklin.

China’s English-language press also offers us a forecast into the Year of the Water Snake. Xinhua describes rural development efforts to be expected in 2013, and the Global Times cites World Bank data predicting that GDP growth, which fell in 2012, will rebound:

The World Bank raised its 2013 economic growth forecast for China Wednesday, citing the government’s fiscal stimulus plans and faster approval of large investment projects.

China’s growth is projected to recover in 2013 to 8.4 percent due to the combination of monetary easing, local government fiscal stimulus, accelerated approval of investment projects and an upswing in the business cycle, the World Bank said in its East Asia and Pacific Economic Update published Wednesday.

The bank also forecast that growth will reach 7.9 percent for 2012, significantly down from 9.3 percent in 2011.

For more on the economic front, Bloomberg reports that China plans to increase its budget deficit by 50 percent in 2013, which could help to boost urbanization and consumer demand.

Next year may also bring further changes to China’s role in the global economy. While foreign firms invested 3.6 percent less in China compared to last year, Chinese firms invested 25 percent more abroad. Chinese FDI has long landed primarily in the developing world, but firms are also beginning to invest seriously in developed countries. Forbes predicts that this trend will continue, and identifies 13 Chinese companies that will “go global” in 2013:

Chinese foreign direct investment has long been characterized as focusing on securing raw materials in emerging markets like Africa and Latin America. But as the list of the top 13 Chinese companies going global below demonstrates, this is no longer the case. Chinese investment continues in strategic natural resources like oil and gas; however, companies in industries ranging from consumer electronics, entertainment, athletic apparel and even luxury boating are all pushing beyond the borders of the Middle Kingdom. Through expansion overseas, they aim to gain access to new distribution channels, international managers, brand recognition and technological expertise in global markets.

While some of the names appearing on the top 13 for 2013 are well on their way to becoming househould names, a few of the others may come as a surprise…

© josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 18th party congress, 2013, economic growth, economic reform, Internet regulation, leadership transition, political reform, predictions, technology, Xi Jinping, year end lists 2012
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WangGuoquan: From today on, I’m changing my profile picture to the two characters “citizen.” These characters were written by Sun Yat-sen and are from a sample of his calligraphy, of which a friend made a rubbing.

王功权 ： 从今天起，把头像换成＂公民＂二字了。这两个字是孙中山书写的，是朋友从孙中山手书样本上拓下来的

On the evening of May 31, a large group of Weibo users using this as their profile picture suddenly found the image had been removed. @WangGongquan and other netizens called this a “mass beheading.” @WangGuoquan’s post about the phone call he made to Sina Weibo management was also deleted:

WangGongquan: When I called you you said the “higher-ups” made you delete my citizen profile picture. You said “it seems there was something not in compliance.” I asked which higher-ups, what department, which person said it was not in compliance? You just hemmed and hawed and said you’ll respond when you understand the situation. You’ve all received a high level of education. What are the two characters “citizen” not in compliance with? They make you delete a profile picture and you delete it. You recklessly injure users like this and is there any limit to your behavior?

王 功权：你们电话回答我说是＂上边＂让你们把我公民二字头像删掉的，说＂好像有什么不符＂，我问是哪个上边什么部门哪个人说不符的？你们便吱吱唔唔，说帮助 了解一下情况再答复。你们受过高等教育，公民二字头像不符合什么了？他们让你删除用户头像你就删，你这样乱伤用户还能有个头儿吗？

@LaoguSays commented on the incident:

LaoguSays: @WangGongquan: Ha! In the first group of “citizens” there were about 200 people on Sina Weibo whose profile pictures were illegally hacked and deleted by the government’s Internet Management Department (should we call them the Web Traitors?). It was a mass beheading, the martyring of heroes. The white characters “citizen” on a blue background has just been prohibited.

老顾说： @王功权：哈！第一批有＂公民＂头像的约200人，在新浪微博被政府网管部门人员（网奸？）非法盗号入博，将＂公民＂头像删除，被群体斩首，英勇就义。蓝底白字的＂公民＂头像，正被查禁。

WangGongquan: The national Internet Management Department at Sina has beheaded its “citizen” users!

王功权:国家网管部门在新浪对用户＂公民＂头像予以斩首！

Below are comments on the “beheading” collected by CDT. Read the original CDT Chinese post here. Translated by Deng Bolun.

Ailsa_su: There’s a profile picture on Sina Weibo that you can’t use. Use it once and you’re blocked. This profile picture is “citizen.” What makes a funny comparison is that you can use a profile picture that reads, “Get verified status and 1000 fans for only X yuan!” [This is a common spam image on Sina Weibo.] @WangGongquan

Ailsa_su：在新浪微博上有一个头像是不能用的，一用你就被封！这个头像就是＂公民＂。形成可笑对比的是你可以用下方＂加v认证粉*元＂的头像！@王功权

DebangLaosan: Oversensitivity to this point, they really don’t have a mote of confidence! What’s the meaning of a little profile picture?

德邦老三：神经过敏至此，真的是一点点底气也没有了！一个小小的头像，至于么？

Killbilldoller1: I’ve been reincarnated [i.e. account was suspended]. If you’re so afraid of us becoming citizens, are you not ashamed to call this a republic? Just be more direct and call it the Slave Empire of China.

Killbilldoller1: 我还直接被转世，这么怕我们成为公民为何还有脸叫公和国？直接叫中国奴隶王朝不更直接

Youyi: No wonder I suddenly saw so many headless users ooze out of Weibo.

幽壹:难怪看到微博上突然冒出那么多无头像的。

YYRushishuo: #MicroIdea All I want to know is, why have the white characters “citizen” against the blue background been deleted for absolutely no reason? If they can do virtual beheadings today, what about tomorrow?

Yy如是说：#WeiJianyi#我只是想知道，蓝底白字的“公民”头像，为何被无缘无故地删掉了？今天能做到虚拟砍头，明天呢？

ThisAge-1984: Citizen profile pictures are beheaded on Sina. It’s June 1, 2012.

这年代-1984：公民头像，被斩首于新浪。于2012、6、1.

FoolsPassage: Change you profile picture and support Mr. @WangGongquan. Give me back my citizen!

愚人渡：换头像支持@王功权 先生，还我公民！

WangruiV6: Sina, give me my head back!!!! The heart of the imposing Celestial Empire suddenly fears a common citizen’s profile picture. What’s sadder is it doesn’t examine itself, but only thinks of censoring, locking up, tearing down and blocking up. You go ahead and keep it up. I only want to give you a few words: water can both float a boat and capsize it. Take care of yourself. It isn’t too late to repent!

王钊V6：新浪还我头来！！！！堂堂天朝官府，竟然怕一个普通的公民头像，更可悲的是他们不反思自己，只想着删，封，拆，堵，你继续把，只想送你八个字：水能载舟亦能煮粥。好自为之，莫要悔之晚矣！

-Lishen-: Sina will even forcefully remove someone’s profile picture if says “citizen.” Whichever dog f*cker came up with this, if you are a person, then stand up. Don’t pull your head in like a turtle.

-李琛–：新浪连人家头像上显示一个公民字样的图片都被强行去掉，这是哪个狗日的意思，你要是个人你就站出来。不要在那里做个缩头乌龟。

HalfCupSettingSun: My profile picture was the two characters “citizen” written by Sun Yat-sen. Sina went and erased it. It’s actually really funny if you think about it. These two characters have become sensitive porcelain. Any hint of titillation and it’s forbidden.

半盏夕阳：我的头像用的是孙中山手书“公民”二字，新浪给我弄没了。 其实想想挺搞笑的 公民俩字都成敏感瓷了 意淫一下都不让

LaonafahaoDengguo: My profile picture has been river crabbed. My final right as a citizen has been taken away.

老衲法号登锅：头像被河蟹了，想做个公民的最后一点权力也被剥夺了

LiuHouboWeibo: @WangGongquan Because your profile picture said “citizen,” it was deleted. Please tell me, when did citizen become a sensitive word? Will “the people” also become a sensitive word? In the end, what will People’s Daily Online become? The Servants Daily Online?

刘俊博的微博：@王功权 因头像使用公民两个字，被强制删除头像。请问什么时候继 公民 成为敏感词之后，人民也成为敏感词？到时候人民网将改名成什么网？臣民网？

CitizenVoiceNotOne: Shit! I look away for a second and my citizen profile picture is nowhere to be seen! What policy has this violated? You assholes!

公民口不一：我靠！一转眼，我的公民头像就不见了啊！公民违反了神马政策？你大爷的！

Ierer: Today the name on my Sina Weibo account suddenly changed. It made me feel really strange. For a while I thought my account had been stolen, but this actually wasn’t the case. It was because I used the two characters “citizen” written by Mr. Yat-sen. I, a nobody, became the subject of Sina’s restrictions.

Ierer：今天新浪微博的头像，名字突然更改，让我感觉很是诡异，一度以为是号被偷了，其实不然，我因为用中山先生手书的“公民”二字做头像，我这个小人物也变成为了新浪的的等级限制对象了。

“Netizen Voices” is an original CDT series. If you would like to reuse this content, please follow the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 agreement.

© Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: censorship, Deng Bolun, Internet censorship, Internet regulation, netizens' voices, sina weibo, weibo
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Weibo Secretary: Dear netizens, in order to maintain order in the Weibo community, we are establishing open and transparent mechanisms to deal with violators of our regulations. Today we are issuing the “Sina Weibo Community Convention (Trial)”, along with the “Community Management Regulations (Trial)” and the “Community Committee System (Trial).” The above regulations will take effect on May 28th, 2012, at which time corresponding features will go live. Order is something that we all must work together to maintain. Read the new policies in their entirety at http://t.cn/zO8hGBj

Since this tweet went up on May 8th at 3pm Beijing time, there have been over 30,000 comments. The Wall Street Journal’s Josh Chin surveys public reaction to the announcement:

Among the thousands of users who responded to the draft document, many said they approved, with some arguing that the proposed set of rules would help manage what they said was an increasing proliferation of rumors and obscene content on the website. “Preserving the good atmosphere on Sina Weibo requires everyone to work hard together,” wrote angel investor Cai Wensheng, who boasts more than 3.5 million followers.

Sina Weibo celebrity and former head of Google’s China operations Kai-Fu Lee also put himself in the approval camp, responding with a simple: “Agree, support!”

Others weren’t so sure. Among those who appeared to hedge was real estate mogul Pan Shiyi, who said it was good to have rules to refer to but added a question: “Does this mean there won’t be any more arbitrary take-downs?”

Still others actively attacked Sina’s new regulations for aping the deliberately vague officialese found in government legal documents, arguing that the definitions of disallowed content are broad enough to legitimize almost any act of censorship. “All this does is provide an excuse for arbitrary take-downs,” real estate executive Sun Xuguang wrote in response to Mr. Pan.

[...]Another user, meanwhile, had a suggestion for a much simpler solution: “Isn’t there a list of sensitive words you can give to everyone so they can consult it before posting?”

After Sina’s failed attempt to fully implement the state regulated “real-name registration“ policy, these conventions are the latest step to codify and control sensitive online content in an effort to thwart a government crackdown on the site. Caijing English has translated and published the entire mandate for self-censorship, paying special attention to Article 13, the section hazily defining sensitive content:

In Article 13, the contract lists nearly ten kinds of information users are not allowed to publish on Weibo, including that “harms the unity, sovereignty, or territorial integrity of the nation” and that “spreads rumors, disrupts social order, and destroys societal stability.”

[...]Article 13) Users have the right to publish information, but may not publish any information that:

1.Opposes the basic principles established by the constitution
2.Harms the unity, sovereignty, or territorial integrity of the nation
3.Reveals national secrets, endangers national security, or threatens the the honor or interests of the nation
4.Incites ethnic hatred or ethnic discrimination, undermines ethnic unity, or harms ethnic traditions and customs
5.Promotes evil teachings and superstitions
6.Spreads rumors, disrupts social order, and destroys societal stability
7.Promotes illicit activity, gambling, violence, or calls for the committing of crimes
8.Calls for disruption of social order through illegal gatherings, formation of organizations, protests, demonstrations, mass gatherings and assemblies
9.Has other content which is forbidden by laws, administrative regulations and national regulations.

This is not the first time that Sina has altered its operating policy to satisfy the state. When recent rumors of a coup in Beijing began spreading after the sacking of former Chongqing Party Secretary Bo Xilai, Sina temporarily disabled their comment feature upon state orders. While cyberspace may always be seen as a breeding ground for rumors and sensitive content, government paranoia is mounting in an atmosphere of political instability and as the (possibly postponed) once-in-a-decade leadership transition approaches.

Also see prior CDT coverage of censorship, self-censorship, and Sina Weibo. For more on sensitive content, see CDT’s “Sensitive Words” series.

© josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: censorship, Internet regulation, microblogs, self-censorship, sina weibo
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The pair, arrested in the city of Changsha Sunday, were accused of spreading a rumor that 5,000 policemen and 100 police vehicles were seen guarding a wedding convoy in the city on Dec. 6, police investigators said.

The two men, both in their twenties, posted a video clip online showing crowds of police officers and a wedding convoy on the street. Police investigators said the incident was a coincidence, as the officers were returning from a training drill and happened to be passing the convoy at that particular moment.

Local police officials said the rumor spread quickly, with the video clip receiving large numbers of hits. The two men will be detained for a total of five days in accordance with relevant laws, the officials said.

Last week, The Wall Street Journal noted a “state-media anti-Internet rumor blitz” as the latest development in Beijing’s battle for control of the Internet, a campaign which includes editorials comparing the dangers of the web to drugs, prostitution and gambling:

“Internet rumors are highly destructive and harmful,” said a piece that was published on Nov. 28 on the People’s Daily website. “It is widely acknowledged that drugs could make people addicted, anaesthetize their nerves, and mess up their physical functions, which will further destroy family units, disturb society as a whole and trigger crime.”

“Doesn’t this mean that Internet rumors are a type of malignant tumor which harms the Internet’s image while eroding social values?” it said, adding that the government would take a “zero tolerance” attitude toward rumors.

Xinhua Online ran the first in a series of commentaries on the subject on the same day, saying Internet rumors are “highly poisonous” – worse, even, than heroin and cocaine. They are “just like beautiful poppy flowers, which are always under pretty disguise, and make people deeply poisoned.”

In addition to cracking down on rumors, the Chinese government has also targeted pornography and vulgarity as it seeks ways to rein in the influence and freedoms of microblogging platforms such as Sina Weibo. Last week, the State Information Office reported that 206 more microblog accounts were shutdown for distributing crude content. The latest campaign also has sought to reform the registration requirements on microblogs – Last week, China Daily reported that Sina Weibo has set up a system to verify the identities of its users:

Micro-bloggers can now go to the site and voluntarily submit their names, ID numbers and their cell phone numbers. Sina Weibo will then have public security departments check that information for accuracy, Mao Taotao, a public relations manager at Sina, said on Friday.

He said micro-bloggers whose ID numbers jibe with police records will receive an “honor medal”, which will be displayed under their user names on the website.

“We are encouraging micro-bloggers to apply for the real-name system, but we don’t expect all users to do that,” he said.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet censorship, Internet crackdown, Internet regulation, microblogs, online public opinion, rumors, sina weibo
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A Shanghai resident surnamed Li was held in local police custody for 15 days for posting a falsified personal income tax document from the State Administration of Taxation in August, and misleading the public, the statement said.

A university student in southwest China’s Yunnan Province was detained for posting a fake news item about a sick man who killed eight village heads in Yunnan, it said.

The editor of a leading gateway surnamed Pei received a warning from his employer for publishing a microblog entry about an air force fighter crash without confirming the source and facts, the statement said.

According to the statement, investigations found that three other popular online news items were not true, and the police are looking for those who were responsible.

The latest crackdowns highlight an increased government focus on containing the activities of China’s more than 500 million Internet users and, more specifically, monitoring content on microblogs such as Sina Weibo. The latest Sina Weibo White Paper, released jointly last week by Sina and Chinese social business intelligence provider CIC, indicates that the site’s registered users have eclipsed 250 million, a nearly 300% surge since the end of 2010 and an increase of approximately 50 million users since the site’s parent announced its quarterly results in June.

Last week’s meeting of the ruling Communist Party’s Central Committee yielded a communique indicating the government’s plans to supervise the online community. From Bloomberg:

The communique said the party will “strengthen guidance and management over social networks and instant messaging tools, regulate online information distribution, and cultivate a civilized, rational Internet environment.”

…

Documents from plenums are second only in importance to resolutions passed every five years by the Communist Party Congress, set to meet next year to pick a new generation of leaders, said Willy Wo-Lap Lam, an adjunct professor of Chinese history at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

This resolution, which focuses on culture, gives the Communist Party a written record that can be used to justify its actions, Lam said in an e-mail.

“The CCP wants to be seen as a party that properly follows precedents, procedure and traditions,” Lam said. “So every time they detain a dissident or whack a website, they can quote from this Culture Resolution.”

See also CDT coverage of the Chinese government’s growing agitation with online rumors, previous crackdowns in August, and the anticipation of more restrictive policies going forward.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet crackdown, Internet regulation, microblogs, online public opinion, rumors, sina weibo
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At yesterday’s meeting, Wang Chen emphasized that “[we] must thoroughly apply a series of guiding spirits of the central Party in regards to internet construction, development and management, keeping to the guiding principle of ‘positive use, scientific development, management by rule of law and ensuring safety’ . . . ” Wang said the government must “thoroughly give play to the positive role of microblogs in serving society, taking concrete steps to develop and manage [them], working together to preserve a healthy and orderly online communication order, serving the overall work of the government and the Party, and serving the masses.”

The news has mixed implications for the future of weibo: ominous in terms of content and freedom of expression, but also reassuring, as the threat of a total shutdown recedes. From China Real Time Report:

Delivered two days before the Communist Party’s Central Committee is scheduled to meet to discuss cultural reforms, the comments helped send shares in Nasdaq Stock Market-listed Sina Corp., operator of the popular Weibo microblogging service, soaring 18% on Thursday as investors appeared reassured that Chinese authorities wouldn’t shut down the service. At about noon on Friday in New York it was down 2.2% to $90.85 ….

While it seems increasingly unlikely that authorities will pull the plug on microblogging sites, Mr. Bishop said investors should be wary of tighter regulation.

“I think it’s going to have somewhat of a chilling effect on the content on Weibo,” he said. “The question is at what point will Sina need to monetize it and what effect will this have on their ability to make money with it.”

Samsung Securities analyst Paul Wuh offered a similar assessment in a note on Friday. “If government regulation increases, microblog services are likely to be more assertive in removing controversial content,” he wrote. “We expect the quality of Weibo to suffer as a result—increasing the risk of a slowdown or even decline in Weibo users.”

See earlier reports of looming weibo controls via CDT, and on Bishop’s DigiCha blog.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet regulation, microblogs, sina weibo, Wang Chen, weibo
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The websites involved “illegal groups which claimed to specialize in deleting online news stories and posts with negative influences or hiring other netizens to spread certain kinds of information or opinions on the Internet” for deals totaling more than 1.13 million yuan ($177,000). The China Daily story didn’t provide details of specific public relations deals.

The crackdown was apparently sparked by allegations last year that dairy company Mengniu was the source of rumors that its competitors products caused premature sexual development in children. Mengniu later said the action was taken by one of its employees without knowledge of the company, and apologized for its effect on consumers ….

Internet users commenting on the latest crackdown criticized the government for using the same tactics as the companies it had targeted. “Please shut down Baidu first, then slap your own face after that door is shut,” quipped a user on Twitter-like microblogging service Sina Weibo writing under the name Ostaryr. Another Weibo user, Yan Haitao, said, “Oh, then does this mean the Central Propaganda Office should be closed?”

Hypocrisy aside, many observers regard the closures as a superficial measure, and are sceptical about their likely effectiveness. Bill Bishop, for example, writes at DigiCha that “online PR in China is a swamp, so any moves to drain it are welcome. But the shuttered websites are not the real problem.”

Sources

China Shutters 6,600 Websites for Manipulating Information Online – China Real Time Report – WSJ
China Closes 6600 Websites For Illegal Online PR Deals, Will Not Change Anything – DigiCha

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Baidu, competition, Internet regulation, public relations, sina weibo
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The websites, calling themselves various combinations of names to express the idea of “I-made-a-bribe”, resumed online services quietly in mid-July after getting permission to register with the Internet regulatory authorities.

“I was a little surprised that its registration could be approved,” said Xiaoxiaosheng, founder of one of the first bribery-exposing websites, who wanted to keep his website low-key and only be identified by his online nickname.

Chinese laws require all Internet content providers in China to register the websites they run with the local communication management bureaus. Websites that fail to get permission from the authorities will be forced offline.

Xiaoxiaosheng said he did not have too much hope for approval after the site was forced to shut down in late June because of the lack of that very registration.

According to Penn-Olson today, however, the sites’ resurrection appears to have been short-lived:

This Sina Tech story reports that another anti-Corruption site called “I Bribed (woxinghuile.info)” (not one of the four “I bribed” sites we wrote about on Tuesday) was granted a license on July 20th, but the license was cancelled on August 9th and the site’s owner announced on Sina Weibo that it was dead for good. This was despite the fact that the site had been toned down somewhat since it’s initial June debut. Its motto was changed from “Uncover the true faces of corrupt government officials” to “Reveal the harmfulness of corruption” and a disclaimer had been added stating that the site did not accept any form of official report and that users should not interfere in the personal business of others. Apparently, these changes were not enough.

Another site, titled “I Bribed Official Chinese Site”, which we did mention in our report on Tuesday but did not link to, was shut down just a few hours after the media (us included) announced it had been reopened. That site had also made significant revisions and had been renamed “Transparent China”, but it lost its new license just a day after it had received it.

© samuel wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: bribery, corrupt officials, corruption, Internet regulation, netizens
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The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) said there were 1.91 million websites operating in China at the end of 2010, 41 percent fewer than a year earlier, attributing the change to stronger regulation.

“Although the Internet is posing some problems for new media, our regulation is becoming stronger, we have taken a very big step in this area,” CASS media expert Liu Ruisheng was quoted as saying on the organisation’s website.

Liu said China had “a very high level of freedom of online speech” and there had been few cases in recent years of sites being closed purely to control speech.

He said a crackdown launched by the government in 2009 under which thousands of sites were shut down was mainly aimed at putting a stop to online pornography, although critics have said other sites were also closed.

But while the number of websites dropped, Liu said Chinese webpages increased in 2010 by 60 billion, an increase of 78.6 percent over 2009.

“This means our content is getting stronger, while our supervision is getting more strict and more regulated,” he said.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet development, Internet regulation
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The unnamed official was quoted Thursday in a report from China’s state-run Xinhua news agency that clarified the role of the new agency amid China’s already crowded Internet regulatory landscape, saying the new State Internet Information Office will coordinate and streamline oversight and enforcement and will be run by officials from agencies already involved with Internet regulation.

The official said “untenable” remarks made by critics are intended to “tarnish the image of China,” according to Xinhua, adding that China’s policies are meant to safeguard information security and the development of the Chinese Internet amid an industry boom. “A small group of people have made irresponsible remarks about China’s Internet regulations, disregarding basic fact,” the official said.

The office aims to deal with the “current bad environment of the Internet in China,” which the person said included fake information, obscene and vulgar material and gambling. Many other nations have legislation in place to restrict similar activity, the official said.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet control. SCIO, Internet regulation
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Hong Kong Ming Pao reports, during an Internet Oversight Meeting recently held in Beijing, the government gave orders to all Internet media about establishing a “self-discipline commissioner.” Eight websites which have micro-blogging services – Sina, Sohu, Netease, Iphonixe, Hexun, SOufang, 139Mobile and Juyou9911 – will make a commitment to set up a “self-discipline commissioner.”

Those “self-discipline commissioners” are specifically responsible for monitoring and censoring online information including porn, violence and politically-sensitive content. Although “self-discipline commissioner” is responsible to his/her own Internet media, his/her work agenda is independent from those company’s internal editorial control processes.

Please click here to read a report from Chinese domestic media.

© Xiao Qiang for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet control, Internet regulation, micro-blogs, Self-discipline Commissioner
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