The emergence of the new communication technology of the Internet in the 90s was widely greeted as a liberating force, akin to the role played by printing presses in the European reformation, or the rise of newspapers and pamphlets during the Industrial revolution.
This has certainly been true in the democratic world. Commerce has been transformed by the web, and 'traditional' print and broadcast media struggle to keep up with the tremendous pace and range of user-generated content, from blogs to YouTube videos. Debate has opened up dramatically, with journalists and commentators suddenly confronted with informed comment from those who would previously have felt disenfranchised from public dialogue.
Similarly, new web-based communities have been formed, offering people the chance to engage with ideas and cultures that would normally remain completely alien, simultaneously enhancing their own individual voice.
While Internet debate and discussion often provides more heat than light, this would seem a small price to pay for the benefits to be gained from the Internet.
However, the very accessibility that is the great advantage of the Internet is also its Achilles heel, when it comes to monitoring and censorship. Whereas the samizdats of a previous era were passed, hand to hand, in secret, today, the distribution and progress of documents of facts and opinions contrary to the authoritarian government's line, via blogs, discussion boards and emails can be monitored precisely.
Nowhere is this more true than the People's Republic of China. The world's largest Communist state runs the world's largest and most wide-ranging internet monitoring and censorship programme.
Approximately 162 million people in China are regular Internet users. The majority of these, of course, are Internet users in the same casual sense as Internet users the world over, i.e., using the web to stay in touch with friends, watch pop videos, read sports reports and so on. One would imagine that the regime does not overly concern itself with the activities of these people.
But such is the nature of the Internet, with its myriad links that could lead a casual user to discover something very different from what she set out to find, that the entire web must be taken in to account.
In January 2006, the Internet Surveillance Division of the Public Security Bureau in Shenzen (one of China's two main Internet hubs, the other being Beijing) introduced the figures of Jingjing and Chacha. These two cartoon characters in police uniform sit in the corner of Chinese websites. The Public Security Bureau said that "we publish the image of Internet Police in the form of a cartoon, with the purpose to let all internet users know that the Internet is not a place beyond of law, the Internet Police will maintain order in all online behaviours."
The intent to create a chilling effect is clear: the Internet is not a free forum, and do not imagine that it is.
How does this work practically?
The most well-known aspect of Internet censorship is commonly called the 'Great Firewall of China'. This operates at router level, allowing Internet Service Providers to 'filter' certain keywords, URLs etc, with technology originally designed to block spam and viruses.
Some of the blacklisted keywords are obvious: 'Tiananmen Square Hunger Strike Group' for example, and many other keywords relating to the events of June 4 1989: or various terms relating to Falun Gong and its newspaper Epoch Times.
Others seem a little more arbitrary: one may understand why a self-described socialist regime would ban various words relating to Adolf Hitler and Nazism, for example, but one must wonder why Chinese web-users are forbidden from, say, learning about North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany, or Deauville in France. More in line with the government's stated aim of protecting public morality and guarding against obscenity on the Internet, phrases such as 'erotic movies' and 'sexual massage' are also proscribed.
Much of this relates to searching international, rather than Chinese sites. But what of the Chinese Internet user who merely wishes to find out what is happening in his own locality?
In September 2005, the Ministry of Information Office and the State Council Information Office jointly issued the 'Provisions on the Administration of Internet News Information Services', bringing the Internet in to line with other media. According to a report by Rebecca McKinnon for Human Rights Watch, under these provisions, news websites are forbidden to publish content that:
- violates the basic principles of China's constitution- jeopardizes the security of the nation, divulges state secrets, subverts the national regime or jeopardizes the integrity of the nation's unity
- Harms the honour or interests of the nation
- Incites hatred against peoples, or racism, or disrupts the solidarity of peoples
- Disrupts national policies on religion, propagates 'evil cults and feudal superstitions'
- Spreads rumours, disturbs social order, or disrupts social stability
- Spreads obscenity, pornography, gambling, violence, terror, or abets the commission of a crime
- Insults or defames third parties, or infringes on the legal rights of third parties
- Incites illegal assemblies, associations, marches, demonstrations or gatherings that disturb social order
- Conduct activities in the name of an illegal civil organisation.
In addition to this, news sites are forbidden to publish any other content 'prohibited by laws or rules'.
These provisions are, of course, deliberately vague. While some can be deciphered - for example – the provision against 'evil cults and feudal superstitions' is obviously a thinly-veiled warning to advocates of Falun Gong and Tibetan Buddhists, others provide endless leeway for censors. Any criticism of any government policy could, for example, 'harm the honour or interest of the nation'. Any criticism of a local party official could be seen as an 'insult to a third party', and pretty much anything at all could potentially 'disrupt the solidarity of peoples', though again, this would seem to be aimed at Tibetans, as well as other minority and separatist groups. The prohibition on the incitement to illegal assemblies, meanwhile, would seem a response to the increasing number of protests organised, most often against local governments' planning policies.
Much attention has been paid in recent times to western companies' complicity in Chinese Internet censorship. Yahoo, in particular, was singled out earlier this year by campaigners and the US congress for handing over details of its users to the authorities.
Writing for Index on Censorship's website is September of this year, Theresa Harris and Morton Sklar of the World Organisation for Human Rights USA told how [Quote]: "Using Yahoo!'s e-mail and discussion group services, Wang Xiaoning – published essays expressing support for democratic reform and a multi-party political system in China. Shi Tao, a Chinese journalist, used Yahoo!'s email service to send news dispatches describing government restrictions placed on journalists leading up to the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. After Yahoo! turned over their identifying information to Chinese authorities, Wang and Shi were subjected to arbitrary arrest, long-term detention, abuse, and torture by Chinese officials. The Chinese courts that convicted them of revealing state secrets and subversion of state power cited Yahoo! numerous times as the source of the information leading to Wang's and Shi's arrests. Both men face several more years of imprisonment.
"In defense of its complicity, Yahoo! claims that it had no other option but to comply with Chinese law. However, a number of other US Internet companies have successfully done business in China without providing the identifying information of their customers that would lead to their arrest, detention, abuse, and torture. Instead, these companies have chosen ways of conducting business in China that do not place Internet users in danger, from locating their servers outside China to not offering certain types of search, chat, and blogging software in China. While these alternatives are not desirable, they are less abusive than causing individual users' arrests and torture."
Yahoo claimed it did not know for what purpose the users' details had been requested by the authorities, but were later forced to admit that this was untrue. After censure from a US congressional committee, Yahoo! Agreed to aid in Shi Tao's legal defence.
Meanwhile, EU-based company Skype has admitted that its TOM-Skype software censors sensitive words in text chats between Chinese users. Skype, again, claims that it is merely adhering to local laws. However, it does not inform Chinese users of specific censorship policies, and does even not inform users that their software is capable of censorship.
But personally, I believe it would be a mistake to focus too much on the complicity of EU and western companies in the monitoring and censorship of discourse on the Chinese Internet. Ultimately, it is the Chinese government that is responsible for what happens in China, both in the street and online. It is the Chinese government that watches blogs: it is the Chinese government that draws up rules on what can and can not be reported on a news site: it is the Chinese government that pays Internet users to post pro-Government propaganda in web discussion – what are known as 'five Mao posts'. And it is the Chinese government that imprisons Internet users on the most spurious of grounds.
The Olympics next year will shine the media spotlight in to China like never before. An unprecedented number of foreign journalists and bloggers will descend on Beijing, and when they do so, it is unlikely that all will stay within the confines of the Olympic stadiums and tourist hotels.
It is important that even before the Olympics, those inside China struggling with censorship know that there is solidarity with them in the outside world, from small organisations like Index on Censorship, all the way up to the European Parliament.
