Originally published May 2 2005
China is highly effective at blocking internet access, thanks to legal and technological controls
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
China's government is keen to prevent a great deal of internet content from reaching its people and it is extensively using both people and computers to do it. US researchers, who wanted to know how effective the Chinese are at blocking web content, found that they are highly effective at keeping certain sites and data out of the country. Blocked sites include almost anything about Taiwanese and Tibetan independence, Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama, the Tiananmen Square protests, or any anticommunist sites. It seems that the Chinese government is eager to keep these events out of people's heads by keeping it off their computers.
China is the world's leading censor of the Internet, filtering web sites, blogs, e-mail, and online forums for sensitive political content, according to a study released Thursday.
The OpenNet Initiative said that China employs thousands officials and private citizens to build a "pervasive, sophisticated, and effective" system of Internet censorship.
"ONI sought to determine the degree to which China filters sites on topics that the Chinese government finds sensitive, and found that the state does so extensively," said the study, published at www.opennetinitiative.net/china.
"Chinese citizens seeking access to Web sites containing content related to Taiwanese and Tibetan independence, Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama, the Tiananmen Square incident, opposition political parties, or a variety of anti-Communist movements will frequently find themselves blocked," the report said.
The study, jointly conducted by Harvard University, the University of Cambridge and the University of Toronto, used four different tests to probe China's Internet blocks from inside and outside China, said John Palfrey, a project leader.
Volunteers inside China ran a special program designed to test what content was blocked by China, while ONI researchers accessed proxy servers in China, posted messages with sensitive content on popular web logs in China and sent test e-mails to and from major Internet Service Providers.
China used multiple, overlapping filtering methods and a mixture of soft and hard controls, including blocking by keywords, formal legal pressures and pressure on users and content providers, he said.
Volunteers who helped run the study faced "substantial risk," he added.
As the regional Internet access provider for Vietnam, North Korea, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, China could export its content controls to those neighbors, said Palfrey, head of Harvard Law's School's Berkman Center for Internet & Society.
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