
China forbids anonymous online posts - thesanerguy
https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/27/china-doubles-down-on-real-name-registration-laws-forbidding-anonymous-online-posts/
======
tim333
Related discussion from yesterday (177 comments)
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109626](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15109626)

------
stephengillie
> _The CAC also specified what content is forbidden from being published
> online (link and translation via Google Translate), citing a list from a
> 2000 bill regulating Internet information services in China. The list is so
> broad that it can cover almost anything:

Article 15 of the Measures for the Administration of Internet Information
Services stipulates that Internet information service providers shall not
make, reproduce, publish or disseminate information containing the following:
(1) opposing the basic principles as defined in the Constitution; (2)
endangering national security (3) to damage national honor and interests; (4)
to incite national hatred, ethnic discrimination and undermine national unity;
(v) to undermine national religious policies and to promote cults and (6)
spreading rumors, disrupting social order and destroying social stability; (7)
spreading pornography, pornography, gambling, violence, murder, terror or
abetting a crime; (8) insulting or slandering others and infringing upon
others (9) Any other content that is prohibited by laws and administrative
regulations._

~~~
thriftwy
Pornography looks like a howler in this list.

What's with pornography in China? I understand they make face that they oppose
it, but I imagine it's quite impossible to make 1G people not try to push this
envelope. How does it work?

Are there any articles about state of things?

~~~
ekianjo
i remember visiting cybercafes in China 13 years ago and half of the guys were
watching streaming porn. And not hiding.

~~~
simonh
Things have changed a lot since then. There's been a big official backlash,
largely because it was getting so blatant and hard to ignore.

Recently the government banned online social media video posts in which young
women sensually and provocatively ate bananas. I'll leave the details to your
imagination. It was getting to be quite a trend, so the authorities stamped on
it. Soon after that the government started requiring he big upload services to
manually vet video posts, and put heavy restrictions on broadcast live
streams.

Simon Hibbs

------
theklub
Next headline "Chinese government approval online sky rockets."

------
userbinator
As I understand it, this only applies to services hosted within China; if you
can get past the Great Firewall and into the "greater Internet", then you're
free to post as anonymously as you want.

~~~
Gracana
I always assumed bypassing the firewall was illegal too. Is that not true?

~~~
steaktartaar_
As far as I'm aware, bypassing the firewall is not illegal, just highly
discouraged.

We openly bypassed the firewall to access Google Analytics data through VPN
and nobody batted an eye. China can't afford to crack down on that without
scaring off pretty much every foreign company looking to do business on the
mainland.

------
tfcata
Well South Korea also requires real name when posting on major websites. I
wonder why nobody made a fuss about that when they did it many years ago.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_South...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_South_Korea)

~~~
westiseast
Is your point that S.Korea does it, so it's OK? Or that we're all a bunch of
hypocrites and shouldn't comment?

This sounds like whataboutism - if you follow the link and read the wikipedia
page, it seems like lots of people made lots of fuss about it, including the
United Nations, EFF, S.Korean press etc.

~~~
tfcata
If you read it careful enough you will notice the criticism cited there
includes things like blog posts and UN speeches, nothing comparable to TC
articles in terms of range of influence. Now what's so special about this
incident so it's worth a whole precious TC headline to make everyone aware of
it?

~~~
MrQuincle
Coverage

[https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/08/what-south-
korea...](https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/08/what-south-korea-can-
teach-us-about-online-anonymity/)

[https://thenextweb.com/asia/2012/08/23/south-korea-scraps-
la...](https://thenextweb.com/asia/2012/08/23/south-korea-scraps-law-
requiring-use-real-names-online/)

[https://mobile.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/technology/naming-
name...](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/technology/naming-names-on-the-
internet.html)

[https://techcrunch.com/2012/07/29/surprisingly-good-
evidence...](https://techcrunch.com/2012/07/29/surprisingly-good-evidence-
that-real-name-policies-fail-to-improve-comments/)

~~~
tfcata
These are coverage when it finally failed. What about when it was first
implemented? This TC article can't even wait.

~~~
MrQuincle
Please, search for yourself. There are many articles critizing South Korea
censorship, back then and now.

It feels like you feel you have to defend the Chinese government. That's your
good right, just don't use a strawman. It doesn't make your point stronger.

------
koolio
Is this the path the western world will take eventually? Anonymity is a very
powerful tool for the masses to get their point across, it's pretty
troublesome if you're the one in power.

~~~
lucaspiller
Not sure why people are downvoting this, but it's a worthwhile discussion to
be had. Given the way the U.K. is going by trying to ban encryption, if that
goes ahead I wouldn't be surprised to see this as the next step.

------
user5994461
>>> China forbids anonymous online posts

Clickbait title. The article doesn't even say that.

~~~
beefsack
The title doesn't seem entirely dissimilar:

> China doubles down on real-name registration laws, forbidding anonymous
> online posts

~~~
user5994461
It's not in the content.

~~~
Retric
Direct quote: "According to the new regulations, Internet companies and
service providers are responsible for requesting and verifying real names from
users when they register and must immediately report illegal content to the
authorities."

~~~
SquareWheel
That would mean that they must use real names when signing up with an ISP, no?
The title implied that they must also use real names when registering to a
website.

"anonymous online posts"

~~~
Retric
It's 'Internet companies _and_ service providers' service providers = ISP,
Internet companies = Facebook

"the country’s top Internet censor announced a new set of regulations (link
via Google Translate) meant to eliminate posts by anonymous users on Internet
forums and other platforms." Just click on the link for a reasonable
translation of the rule.

------
purple-again
Imagine how much better the discussion would be on sites like Reddit if the
default was Real Identity and some sections were anonymous. How much better
Amazon reviews would be. The return of commment sections on major news
articles (the shit show or sexist racist trolls would stop almost immediately
if you faced real life consequences).

I wonder if there is a market for a verified Online Real Identity service that
could be used to solve some of these cancerous corners of the internet that
comes with anonymity.

~~~
icelancer
>>the shit show or sexist racist trolls would stop almost immediately if you
faced real life consequences

Facebook comments don't seem to stop these. I'm shocked at what people post
under their real name with a social media link handy.

~~~
jamesrcole
On a bit of a tangent, I wonder if it'd help things if it was easy to view all
the comments a person has made using their FB identity? There'd be a much
stronger sense in which their comments are associated with them, and
potentially a greater disincentive on being a dick.

