The Chinese government shut down 5,098 websites providing pornographic video chat services during a nationwide campaign running from September to November of this year, a government official said.
Pornographic chat-rooms have become increasingly common in China, generally consisting of a woman hired to sit naked with a PC camera while chatting online with patrons. Providers of the service rent space for these chat-rooms from other websites, making it more difficult for authorities to find and shut down their operations. Moreover, the chat-rooms take significant precautions to guard access to the services.