History of Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China

A history of Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China has existed since Internet access in the People's Republic of China (PRC) became widespread.

The special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau have their own legal systems and therefore do not share the same history in this regard.

Timeline

*In 2003, Internet activists and journalists led an online uprising that eventually forced the abolishment of the Custody and repatriation procedure, and the establishment of constitutional committee of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. []

*In May 2006, Chinese Internet users encountered difficulties when connecting to Hotmail, a popular email service provided by Microsoft. Although Microsoft stated that the reason was a technical issue, many media reported their speculation and linked the event to Internet censorship. [cite web |url= http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19133885-36375,00.html|title= Microsoft throws cold water on China Hotmail ban scare |last= |first= |date= |publisher= The Australian] [cite web |url= http://news.ft.com/cms/s/7d186064-e1e2-11da-bf4c-0000779e2340.html |title= Chinese Hotmail users suffer disruptions|last= Dyer|first= Geoff |coauthors= Dickie, Mure |date= 2006-05-12|publisher= Financial Times]

*Still in May 2006, users have been reporting problems accessing POP mailboxes in many big mail providers (although POP-over-SSL works fine). In the last week of May, Google and many of its services became unreachable. It is as yet unconfirmed whether these are instances of blocking, or something else.

*In July 2006, researchers at Cambridge University claim to have defeated the firewall by ignoring the TCP reset packets. [cite web |url= http://www.zdnetasia.com/news/security/0,39044215,39372326,00.htm|title= Academics break the Great Firewall of China|last= Espiner|first= Tom|authorlink= |date= 2006-07-04|publisher= ZD Net Asia]

*On August 7, 2006, some Wikipedians in China found they cannot access Wikipedia via some proxy tools. Wikimedia proxy services in the United States and in Korea have been masked by the Great Firewall. And the blocking has been enforced to URL-level because if users in China link to the URL addresses of Wikipedia (all languages), Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimania 2006 and [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/CWMC_2006 Chinese Wikimedia Conference 2006] websites, users will get the "connection has been reset" error. Some Wikipedians in China believe this might be related with a two-page news story entitled "Wikipedia-maniac.", [http://www.nanfangdaily.com.cn/southnews/pdf/xjb/20060806/B11.Pdf] [http://www.nanfangdaily.com.cn/southnews/pdf/xjb/20060806/B12.Pdf] which appeared in the August 6 issue of the "Beijing News" ( [http://www.thebeijingnews.com 新京報] ).

*As of (at least) September 27, 2006, Blogspot blogs (which had been blocked previously) can be accessed within China.

*As of (at least) October 10, 2006, English Mediawiki sites can be accessed even without a proxy in China, though Chinese sites were reported to be blocked. The secure server, on the other hand, cannot, for whatever reason, be accessed. Some China Telecom users report access to the larger part of Wikipedia, including pages regarding Taiwan, but not other more politically sensitive pages. This article is accessible as of October 26, 2006 from Beijing. The Chinese government has currently decided to permit access to the English Wikipedia although some areas are not accessible in the PRC.

*According to Reporters without Borders, the Chinese language version of Wikipedia was unblocked around November 13, 2006.

*According to the Associated Press, both Chinese and English versions of Wikipedia were again inaccessible on November 17, 2006. They report: "It wasn't immediately clear if Wikipedia was inaccessible due to technical glitches or because government censors had blocked the site." For more information, see Blocking of Wikipedia in mainland China.

*On January 24, 2007, Chinese state media reported that Hu Jintao had vowed to "purify" the Internet. Hu apparently made no specific mention of censorship, saying China needed to "strengthen administration and development of our country's Internet culture." [cite web |url= http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=technologyNews&storyid=2007-01-24T171156Z_01_PEK95705_RTRUKOC_0_US-CHINA-INTERNET-HU.xml&src=rss&rpc=22|title= China's Hu vows to "purify" Internet|date= 2006-01-24|publisher= Reuters]

*On or around March 5, 2007, access to the LiveJournal blogging service from within China became blocked.

*On or around March 13, 2007, access to the Xanga blogging service from within China became blocked. [http://greatfirewallofchina.org/discussions/1377/url]

*On or around March 20, 2007, access to the Blogger and Blogspot services from within China became blocked.

*On or around March 28, 2007, the Blogger and Blogspot services became accessible from within China

*On 15 June 2007, the English version of Wikipedia could be displayed again. But the Chinese language version remains blocked.

*On 15 June 2007, Blogspot was blocked in China, but as of 07 August Blogspot was reopened.

References