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China: Censorship instructions in January 2011

Categories: China, Regulation

In China, censorship instructions are issued by a number of government and CCP authorities. The China Digital Times has translated a number of censorship instructions issued in January 2011 to outline the magnitude of censorship practice in China.

The selected instructions are issued by the State Council Information Office, the Ministry of Public Security, the CCP Central Propaganda Bureau, the Internet Surveillance Office, Provincial Party Propaganda Bureau. As explained by the CDT:

In China, several political bodies are in charge of Internet content control. At the highest level, there is the Central Propaganda Department, which ensures that media and cultural content follows the official line as mandated by the CCP. Then there is the State Council Information Office (SCIO), which has established “Internet Affairs Bureau” to oversee all Websites that publish news, including the official sites of news organizations as well as independent sites that post news content.

This “Internet Affairs Bureau,” sent out very specific instructions to all large news websites daily, and often multiple times per day. Those instructions do not always mean that related contents are completely banned online, but they instruct websites to highlight or suppress certain type of opinions or information in a very detailed manner.

As for the 2011 Egypt uprising, the government authorities had make a threat to shut down websites which are lax in monitoring:

Disturbances in Egypt

January 28, 2011

From the State Council Information Office and Bureau 11 of the Ministry of Public Security:

For the disturbances in Egypt, media across the nation must use copy circulated from Xinhua. Websites are to strengthen [monitoring] of posts, forums, blogs, and particularly posts on microblogs. Our bureaus will forcibly shut down websites that are lax in monitoring.

More from China Digital Times.