China to Censor: Text Messages?
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Given China's history of censorship and the country's well-publicized recent battle with Google, one is rarely surprised by new reports of censorship in China. Providers of mobile phones in China recently announced plans to monitor the texts of citizens for "illegal or unhealthy content," immediately stopping a person's cellphone service if such content is detected.
The phone companies will pass any potential violations on to the police for review and prosecution. If a customer is relieved of the charges, his or her phone service will begin again.
This crusade is officially part of an effort to keep pornography from the country. Over 5,000 people were arrested in China last year on internet pornography charges.
Phone services haven't been explicit on what constitutes a punishable offense, but services will monitor a specific list of words provided by officials. Every communication using these phone services will be monitored, including conversations between a husband and wife.
China's going farther than expected for this one. With no idea about what words and phrases to avoid, people are sure to get their phones disconnected often. A majority of the 'criminals' investigated by the police will be innocent. Anyone who is actually talking about something illegal will use codes or slang. This is an absolutely useless endeavor and will cause much more harm than good... but isn't that always the way?
1 comments:
Was it mentioned at all that they specifically would not send out a list of inappropriate words?
I think you're right. China really is going too far with this one and I think it's the situation with Google that triggered it. I don't think they liked being proven to that Google can just rip the rug out from under their feet, so to speak, and remove themselves from China completely.
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