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The great firewall of China: Xi Jinping's internet shutdown
The great firewall of China: Xi Jinpings internet shutdown
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jun/29/the-great-firewall-of-china-xi-jinpings-internet-shutdown
Before Xi Jinping, the internet was becoming a more vibrant political space for Chinese citizens. But today the country has the largest and most sophisticated online censorship operation in the world. By Elizabeth C Economy
Fri 29 Jun 2018 01.00 EDT
In December 2015, thousands of tech entrepreneurs and analysts, along with a few international heads of state, gathered in Wuzhen, in southern China, for the countrys second World Internet Conference. At the opening ceremony the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, set out his vision for the future of Chinas internet. We should respect the right of individual countries to independently choose their own path of cyber-development, said Xi, warning against foreign interference in other countries internal affairs.
No one was surprised by what they heard. Xi had already established that the Chinese internet would be a world unto itself, with its content closely monitored and managed by the Communist party. In recent years, the Chinese leadership has devoted more and more resources to controlling content online. Government policies have contributed to a dramatic fall in the number of postings on the Chinese blogging platform Sina Weibo (similar to Twitter), and have silenced many of Chinas most important voices advocating reform and opening up the internet.
It wasnt always like this. In the years before Xi became president in 2012, the internet had begun to afford the Chinese people an unprecedented level of transparency and power to communicate. Popular bloggers, some of whom advocated bold social and political reforms, commanded tens of millions of followers. Chinese citizens used virtual private networks (VPNs) to access blocked websites. Citizens banded together online to hold authorities accountable for their actions, through virtual petitions and organising physical protests. In 2010, a survey of 300 Chinese officials revealed that 70% were anxious about whether mistakes or details about their private life might be leaked online. Of the almost 6,000 Chinese citizens also surveyed, 88% believed it was good for officials to feel this anxiety.
For Xi Jinping, however, there is no distinction between the virtual world and the real world: both should reflect the same political values, ideals, and standards. To this end, the government has invested in technological upgrades to monitor and censor content. It has passed new laws on acceptable content, and aggressively punished those who defy the new restrictions. Under Xi, foreign content providers have found their access to China shrinking. They are being pushed out by both Xis ideological war and his desire that Chinese companies dominate the countrys rapidly growing online economy..........................................
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The great firewall of China: Xi Jinping's internet shutdown (Original Post)
riversedge
Jul 2018
OP
pangaia
(24,324 posts)1. Coming to Amerika.
I truly worry about this..
I mean, just in our own small world here... what will happen to DU?
gordianot
(15,234 posts)2. It was only 3 decades ago many Chinese did not know men walked on the moon.
It is hard to take away what people expect. It will be difficult to close that gate.