sensitive words

Mass Censorship of National Corpse Trafficking Scandal

The reported theft and illegal sale of thousands of human corpses for use as raw material in bone graft procedures has shocked the Chinese public and sparked a breathtaking wave of censorship online. Last Thursday, a Beijing...

Rats! Taobao Censors Toys, Vendors Cry Fowl

Toys riffing on China’s hottest online idiom, “calling a rat a duck,” were yanked from online shelves this past week, a sign of the idiom’s continued political sensitivity.  The tongue-in-cheek saying “calling a rat a duck”...

Word(s) of the Week: Big G (胖虎 Pàng Hǔ)

Today, June 15, is Xi Jinping’s 70th birthday. The birthday itself is a taboo topic on Weibo. Commentary has been restricted to state-affiliated accounts, all of which relay identical pablum about well-wishes from friendly heads...

How a Chinese Company Censors Its Own Answer to ChatGPT

Today, Weibo censors deleted a photograph of a flowchart demonstrating how security software giant Qihoo 360 censors its generative artificial intelligence (AI) product. During a June 13 launch event for Qihoo 360’s latest large...

Word of the Week: Huminerals (人矿 rén kuàng)

The new word “humineral” (人矿 rén kuàng) has taken the Chinese internet by storm and is now a sensitive word subject to censorship. First introduced in a now-censored Zhihu post on January 2, 2023, “humineral”—a portmanteau of 人...

WeChat “Bug” Turns Out To Be Obscure Insult for Xi Jinping

A group of students under the impression they had discovered a WeChat “bug” that hides the phrase “200 jin of dumplings” (roughly 220 pounds) had in fact stumbled upon an obscure insult for Xi Jinping that triggers automatic...

Sensitive Words: Top 10 Censored Terms of 2021

CDT Editor’s Note: As we enter 2022, CDT has compiled a special series of features for our readers, offering a look back at the people, events, controversies, memes and sensitive words that defined the past year. Some of this...

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