User:RodeArm/sandbox

Goal of the Firewall

Article 15 of a September 20, 2000 document from the Chinese State Council, posted by the Xinhua News Agency, lists 9 categories of information which should be censored, blocked, or filtered from access to the citizens using the internet within China:


 * 1) Opposing the basic principles as they are confirmed in the Constitution.
 * 2) Jeopardizing the security of the nation, divulging state secrets, subverting state power, or jeopardizing the integrity of the nation's unity
 * 3) Harming the honor or the interests of the nation
 * 4) Inciting hatred against peoples, racism against peoples, or disrupting the solidarity of peoples
 * 5) Disrupting national policies on religion, propagating evil cults and feudal superstitions
 * 6) Spreading rumors, disturbing social order or disrupting social stability
 * 7) Spreading obscenity, pornography, gambling, violence, murder, terror, or abetting the commission of a crime
 * 8) Insulting or defaming third parties, infringing on the legal rights and interests of third parties
 * 9) Containing any other content prohibited by law or administrative rules

To filter this content, the Chinese government not only uses its own blocking methods, but it also heavily relies on internet companies, such as ISPs, Social Media operators such as Weibo, and others to actively censor their users. This results in private companies censoring this own platform for filtered content, forcing Chinese internet users to use websites not hosted in China to access this information, much of this information is related to sensitive topics, and especially organized large public discussion of these topics. The Great Firewall was created in response, by the Chinese government, to prevent users from accessing foreign websites which, in their opinion host content which would be ‘spiritual pollution’ (清除精神污染运动) to the Chinese population. These topics include:


 * Names of government leaders, such as Xi Jinping and Deng Xiaoping


 * Political movements and protests


 * Falun Gong and Cults


 * The Tiananmen Square Massacre and other ethnic issues


 * The Xinjiang internment camps


 * Discussions of Tibetan Independence

Specific English Websites blocked or filtered include many popular search engines, social media platforms, information hosting cites, and video hosting websites such as: Google search, Facebook, Wikipedia, YouTube, Twitter and many more. List of websites blocked in mainland China

Impact on People in China

The Cybersecurity Law behind the firewall being targeted at helping increase internet user privacy, and increased protections on personal data, and making companies more responsible for monitoring bad actors, in hopes to make a safer place on the internet for Chinese citizens. Despite this, there have been growing criticisms that the actions of the Chinese government have only hurt Chinese free speech, due to increased censorship, and lack of non-sanctioned sources of information, such as Wikipedia and many English news sources. This has resulted in reports of some cases of legal persecution of those charged with spreading this ‘spiritually polluting’ information.

The Chinese government itself does legally support free speech, article 35 of the Constitutions of the People's Republic states that "citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession, and of demonstration." In recent decades, many criticisms of the Chinese government found that some of these laws are often abused. A study by PEN America claimed that: "Some of the government’s most rights-abusive laws are aimed at criminalizing free speech that—in the eyes of the government—encourages subversion, separatism, or rejection of the State’s authority."

Censorship of sensitive topics, in China has also been easier for the government because of the firewall and filtering. Because the monitoring of social media and chat apps in China presents a possibility of punishment a user, the discussion of these topics is now limited to the correct thought of the Communist Party, or one’s home and private spaces, reducing the chance for information about these topics to spread, reducing any threat of protest against the Communist Party. According Yaqiu Wang, a prominent Human Right researcher, there was a time in China where the internet provided a method for Chinese citizens to learn about these sensitive topics the government had censored in news, through the access to international news reports and media coverage. She claims that in the past 10 years, it has been increasingly difficult to access second opinions on events, meaning students rarely have the opportunity to learn diverging viewpoints, only the correct thought of the Communist Party.

Resistance

         

The Great Firewall has certainly had an impact on Chinese citizens ability to find information about sensitive topics for the Communist Party, but that has not completely stopped them from using the internet to access this information. The firewall itself has created much frustration amongst both individuals and internationally operating companies in China, many of whom have turned to VPNs, speaking in codes,

and other methods to retain their access to the international internet.

The use of VPNs in China can provide individuals access to the international internet, but in China it can be a potential legal risk. In 2017, the Chinese government declared all unauthorized VPN services to be illegal. An example of the use of this punishment is Vera Zhou, a Student at the University of Washington, who when visiting her Parents in China, used a VPN to access her school homework. She was arrested and sent to an education camp from October 2017 until March 2018 and was not able to return to the US until September 2019.

Economic Impacts

Aside from the social control aspect, the Great Firewall also acts as a form of trade protectionism that has allowed China to grow its own internet giants, such as Tencent, Alibaba, and Baidu. China has its own version of many foreign web properties, for example: Tencent Video (YouTube), Sina Weibo (Twitter), Qzone (Facebook), WeChat (WhatsApp), Ctrip (Orbitz and others), Zhihu (Quora). With nearly one quarter of the global internet population (700 million users), the internet behind the GFW can be considered a "parallel universe" to the Internet that exists outside.