The government has long characterized the
Muslim Uyghur community as presenting a separatist threat, and has blocked not only the site of
the Uyghur American Association (whose president, Rebiya Kadeer, is an exiled former political
prisoner and human rights activist) but has also
blocked a substantial number of sites on Islam in
Arabic, including those presenting extremist
viewpoints (www.alumah.com).
China filters a significant number of sites
presenting alternative or additional perspectives
on its policies toward Taiwan and North Korea.
For example, the main portal of the Taiwanese
government (www.gov.tw) as well as its Mainland
Affairs Council were among the many official
sites blocked, along with the Democratic
Progressive Party (DPP) of Taiwan (www.dpp.
org.tw).
Other topics bridging the political-social
divide, such as corruption, were not treated uniformly. Among the limited anticorruption Web
sites filtered was the New Threads site
(www.xys.org), run by the scientist Fang Shimin
and focusing on academic fraud. The only
HIV/AIDS-related site to be filtered was the
English-language
China
AIDS
Survey
(www.casy.org), a site not updated since 2005.
All other content relating to public health,
women’s rights, reproductive health, the environment, and development that ONI tested was
accessible.
Of blocked Web sites, the major exceptions
to the focus on politically sensitive topics specific to China are circumvention tools and pornography. A portion, though not a majority, of proxy
tools and anonymizers in both the Chinese
(www.gardennetworks.com) and English language (www.peacefire.org) was blocked. The circumvention tool Psiphon (psiphon.civisec.org) is
also blocked. Both ISPs also blocked a substantial amount of pornographic content.
While the IP address of the blog search
engine Technorati was blocked by both ISPs, at
time of testing no blog hosting service was
blocked by either ISP. However, though Google’s
Blogspot domain (www.blogger.com) was accessible, all individual Blogspot blogs tested were
accessible on China Netcom and blocked or
inaccessible on China Telecom. Ongoing ONI
testing has confirmed that Blogspot has been
blocked for several years in China, with periods
of intermittent accessibility.
Hong Kong
ONI also conducted testing on two ISPs in Hong
Kong, City Telecom (HK) Limited and PCCW, and
found no evidence of filtering. However, the mainland government blocks a significant amount of
content originating from its own special administrative region. In addition to many independent
newspapers, sites operating out of Hong Kong
that focus on political reform and governance—
even those not focusing on mainland affairs but
instead on exclusively local issues (such as the
Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor)—are
blocked across most of the categories where filtering occurs. Thus, Hong Kong–based alternative media, grassroots NGOs and coalitions
(www.alliance.org.hk), religious organizations,
and legitimate political parties (www.dphk.org)
are all affected.
Conclusion
As China’s Internet community continues to grow
exponentially, the government continues to refine
its technical filtering system while deputizing
a range of actors, including users, ISPs and
content providers, to limit the ability of its citizens
to access and post content the state considers
sensitive. A complex, overlapping system of legal
regulation, institutionalized practices, and informal methods has been extended from print and
broadcast media to the Internet. A consistent feature of regulation of the Chinese Internet has
been the lack of transparency, which has long
been a hallmark of the government’s management and suppression of information.
268
Country Summaries
Muslim Uyghur community as presenting a separatist threat, and has blocked not only the site of
the Uyghur American Association (whose president, Rebiya Kadeer, is an exiled former political
prisoner and human rights activist) but has also
blocked a substantial number of sites on Islam in
Arabic, including those presenting extremist
viewpoints (www.alumah.com).
China filters a significant number of sites
presenting alternative or additional perspectives
on its policies toward Taiwan and North Korea.
For example, the main portal of the Taiwanese
government (www.gov.tw) as well as its Mainland
Affairs Council were among the many official
sites blocked, along with the Democratic
Progressive Party (DPP) of Taiwan (www.dpp.
org.tw).
Other topics bridging the political-social
divide, such as corruption, were not treated uniformly. Among the limited anticorruption Web
sites filtered was the New Threads site
(www.xys.org), run by the scientist Fang Shimin
and focusing on academic fraud. The only
HIV/AIDS-related site to be filtered was the
English-language
China
AIDS
Survey
(www.casy.org), a site not updated since 2005.
All other content relating to public health,
women’s rights, reproductive health, the environment, and development that ONI tested was
accessible.
Of blocked Web sites, the major exceptions
to the focus on politically sensitive topics specific to China are circumvention tools and pornography. A portion, though not a majority, of proxy
tools and anonymizers in both the Chinese
(www.gardennetworks.com) and English language (www.peacefire.org) was blocked. The circumvention tool Psiphon (psiphon.civisec.org) is
also blocked. Both ISPs also blocked a substantial amount of pornographic content.
While the IP address of the blog search
engine Technorati was blocked by both ISPs, at
time of testing no blog hosting service was
blocked by either ISP. However, though Google’s
Blogspot domain (www.blogger.com) was accessible, all individual Blogspot blogs tested were
accessible on China Netcom and blocked or
inaccessible on China Telecom. Ongoing ONI
testing has confirmed that Blogspot has been
blocked for several years in China, with periods
of intermittent accessibility.
Hong Kong
ONI also conducted testing on two ISPs in Hong
Kong, City Telecom (HK) Limited and PCCW, and
found no evidence of filtering. However, the mainland government blocks a significant amount of
content originating from its own special administrative region. In addition to many independent
newspapers, sites operating out of Hong Kong
that focus on political reform and governance—
even those not focusing on mainland affairs but
instead on exclusively local issues (such as the
Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor)—are
blocked across most of the categories where filtering occurs. Thus, Hong Kong–based alternative media, grassroots NGOs and coalitions
(www.alliance.org.hk), religious organizations,
and legitimate political parties (www.dphk.org)
are all affected.
Conclusion
As China’s Internet community continues to grow
exponentially, the government continues to refine
its technical filtering system while deputizing
a range of actors, including users, ISPs and
content providers, to limit the ability of its citizens
to access and post content the state considers
sensitive. A complex, overlapping system of legal
regulation, institutionalized practices, and informal methods has been extended from print and
broadcast media to the Internet. A consistent feature of regulation of the Chinese Internet has
been the lack of transparency, which has long
been a hallmark of the government’s management and suppression of information.
268
Country Summaries