More crack down on social media sites in China
By Lobsang Tenchoe
DHARAMSALA, August 11: Chinese cyber-security regulators have placed China’s major social networking sites under investigation for potential violations.
China’s social networking sites such as Weibo, Wechat and Baidu Tieba are being investigated by the Chinese cyber-security regulators for content that endangers national security, the mainland’s office for cyberspace administration said on Friday, reports cnbc.com.
“The social media platforms of the three companies WeChat, Tieba and Weibo respectively — have users spreading “violence and terror, false rumors, obscene pornography and other content that endangers national security, public safety and social order,” the report stated citing English translation of the notice on the office’s website.
Citing earlier investigations, the notice stated that the platforms are being used to spread terrorism related materials, rumors and obscenities which are in violation of the cyber-security laws.
Internet in China is being heavily censored and regulated under the Communist Party’s cyber-security law. The content on internet are being routinely censored to weed out issues the party deems sensitive and taboo.
Social networking sites like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are blocked in China along with google search engine and major foreign media outlets.
Amidst China’s heightened clampdown on internet under Xi Jingping, China has recently issued a stringent regulation on Virtual Private Networks(VPN) to crack down on the use of software which allows users to get around its heavy internet censorship.
