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Cyber-censors turn the screw on Internet users
Reporters Without Borders 无国界记者 | 21 March 2011
Google Mail targeted
Google accused the Chinese authorities today of being behind problems with its email service, Gmail. Since the end of February, Chinese users have reported difficulties gaining access to Gmail’s home page and sending e-mails. Google’s instant messaging service is also said to have been having problems.
A Google spokesperson contacted by Reporters Without Borders ruled out technical problems as the source of the problem, blaming instead “a government blockage designed to look like the problem is with Gmail.”
Google reported on its blog on 11 March: “We’ve noticed some highly targeted and apparently politically motivated attacks against our users. We believe activists may have been a specific target.”
This is not the first time Google has complained of this kind of attack. In the beginning of 2010, the US company stopped submitting to government censorship of the Chinese version of its search engine after cyber attacks were launched from China against the Gmail accounts of certain journalists and human rights activists.
When Chinese users click on the home page of google.cn, they are now re-directed to google.com.hk, where uncensored search results are available in simplified Chinese characters.
This new attempt at censorship comes as the Chinese authorities try to suppress the many calls for demonstrations that have been prompted by the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions.
Filtering has been beefed up. Terms like “Egypt” and “jasmine” (a reference to the “jasmine revolution” in Tunisia) have joined the long list of key words blocked by the Chinese authorities. Repression against activists has increased. Dozens have been arrested following calls for public meetings.
The phrase “nuclear leak” has also been blocked by the authorities as the government tries to head off any kind of social unrest that may be sparked by fears of a potential spread of radioactivity from the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. A service put in place by Google to help find people missing after the earthquake is also thought to have been disrupted in China.
Tibet under pressure
Meanwhile, criticism of China’s policy of assimilation in the autonomous region of Tibet surfaced again on 10 March, the 52nd anniversary of the Tibetan uprising and the day the Dalai Lama decided step down as head of the Tibetan government. This triggered another flurry of activity by the censors.
The Chinese-language Tibetan site TibetCul.com disappeared from the Internet at 6 p.m. on 16 March. Portrayed as a bridge between Tibetan and Chinese cultures, the site had become a Tibetan Internet landmark and a genuine source of information about the region’s bloggers.
The site’s webmasters have always taken great care over the content of the sites they hosted so as not to provoke the Chinese authorities. They still do not know exactly why they have been hit by this sanction. The site myBuddala.com, associated to TibetCul.com, and its social network, Love.MyBuddala.com, were also shut down shortly after 10 March.
“Censorship and the restriction of information violate basic human decency,” the Dalai Lama said in his speech on 10 March. “For instance, China’s leaders consider the communist ideology and its policies to be correct. If this were so, these policies should be made public with confidence and open to scrutiny.”
Banned from communicating with foreigners during the election of the new Tibetan parliament and constantly under surveillance, Tibetan journalists, bloggers and writers are in the authorities’ line of sight.
The latest wave of repression, launched after the March 2008 uprising, has never ceased. Since then, at least 50 Tibetans have been arrested and some have been sentenced to lengthy jail terms for sending information, photographs or videos out of the country.
China is on Reporters Without Borders the list of countries that are “Enemies of the Internet”. See the report published on 12 March.
Source:
中国
Reporters Without Borders 无国界记者 | 2011年 3月22担忧遭到质疑，当局再次收紧网络审查的大网
当局攻击 Gmail
美国谷歌公司在2011年3月21日指责中国当局是Gmai聊天通讯受干扰的罪魁祸首。中国用户反映，自从2月末开始，登陆Gmail首页和发送邮件会不时出现问题，即时聊天功能紊乱。
无国界记者采访了一位谷歌公司发言人，发言人否认了存在技术问题：“政府是干扰的源头，他们让用户以为是Gmail本身的问题。”在博客上，谷歌公司指出，3月11日发现“网络定点攻击，很明显这些攻击有政治目的，反对我们的使用者。我们认为活动人士应该是遭打击的特殊目标。
”这已经不是谷歌公司第一次遭受这种袭击了，2010年初，一些记者、维权人士的Gmail遭到攻击后，谷歌公司拒绝在中国继续实行自我审查。当中国大陆用户点击google.cn首页时，会自动转到google.com.hk，用户可以看到没有经过审查的简体中文搜寻结果。
在自从突尼斯、埃及革命爆发以来，呼吁游行的声音越来越多，中国当局试图扑灭这些声音，这次新的审查行动是在这样的环境下发生的。这表现出当局对所有不利于稳定的尝试高度警惕，网络过滤进一步加强。“埃及”、“茉莉花”这些词加入了已经十分冗长的“电子长城”禁忌关键词名单。对活动者的镇压行动强化。几十名和呼吁民众集会的有关的活动者已经被捕。
“核泄漏”一词也被中国网络禁止，政府试图预防所有因福岛县核辐射可能蔓延引起的恐慌所致的社会动荡。谷歌公司提供的确定日本地震失踪人口的服务在中国也遭到干扰。西藏受到压力同时，2011年3月10日，在西藏民众起义52周年纪念与达赖喇嘛权力交接前夕，批评中央政府同化西藏自治区政策的声音重新高涨，导致审查进一步加紧。
2011年3月16日18时，中文西藏网站TibetCul.com从网络上消失。该网站是西藏文明与华夏文明的桥梁，成为西藏网络的标志性网站，并且是获得该地区博客作者消息的来源。该网站管理人员一直对网站博客的文章内容非常谨慎，以免惹恼中国当局。网站管理人员至今不明白网站被关闭的确切原因。TibetCul.com子站myBuddala.com的社会网络love.MyBuddala.com也在3月10日前不久被关闭。
达赖喇嘛在3月10日的讲话中说道：“审查和限制信息有损人的尊严。比如，中国共产党领导人认为共产主义思想和他们采取的措施是正确的。如果是这样的话，应该充满信心地把这些措施公布于众，开放选举”。在新的西藏议会选举之际，禁止和外国联系，而且持续监视强度加大。西藏的记者、博客作者、作家在当局高度注意的名单中。自从2008年3月骚乱爆发，镇压行动一直没有停止过，至今有至少五十名藏人被捕，百余人被判重刑，原因是向境外发送信息、照片、视频。
中国是无国界记者评选的十大“网络敌人”之一，详见2011年3月12日的报告：http://en.rsf.org/
Source:
Asia-Pacific Desk
Reporters Without Borders
Paris - France
33 1 44 83 84 70
