Do Chinese authorities need more laws to surveil people? From the earliest days of the Chinese Communist Party, authorities have kept the closest of eyes on all behavior for signs of dissent. <\/p>\n
Sophie Richardson
China Director
\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200bDECEMBER 12, 2016 2:03PM EST<\/p>\n
Do Chinese authorities need more laws to surveil people? From the earliest days of the Chinese Communist Party, authorities have kept the closest of eyes on all behavior for signs of dissent<\/a>. At that time, party members were obliged to report on one another; during the Cultural Revolution, that grim responsibility was imposed on teachers, married couples, and even children. Whether through the street committee system, the dossiers kept by work units, or the police-run \u201cgrid system<\/a>,\u201d Beijing has demonstrated consistent zeal for vast, intrusive surveillance networks.<\/p>\n The Chinese government\u2019s love-hate relationship with online speech is well-documented. Beijing has expanded connectivity primarily for economic reasons, but also as a means to monitor and control individual views. The government has prosecuted people, like Uighur economist and peaceful critic Ilham Tohti<\/a> and human rights lawyer Pu Zhiqiang<\/a>, for their online speech, adopted regulations setting out restrictions on content, and paid the \u201cfifty-cent army\u201d to steer online discussions to praise the government. <\/p>\n In the past year alone, authorities have issued multiple directives to gag online speech, such as criminalizing the \u201cspreading of rumors\u201d about natural disasters, and issuing new rules requiring app providers to keep user logs for 60 days to reduce the spread of \u201cillegal information.\u201d Recently, a leaked police report described virtual private networks (VPNs), widely used by businesses, journalists, and ordinary users to protect their privacy and evade the \u201cGreat Firewall,\u201d as \u201cterrorist software<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Between July and October 2016 alone, authorities shut down seven web-based news channels of Sohu, Sina, Netease, and Ifeng; imposed new requirements on websites, including requiring staff to monitor content round the clock; closed the influential intellectual website Consensus for \u201ctransmitting incorrect ideas;\u201d and issued new rules on live streaming platforms, requiring companies to monitor user content that threatens national security. Many domestic Internet companies employ hundreds of \u201ccensors\u201d to proactively search for and restrict any user-generated content that could run afoul of broadly drawn censorship laws.<\/p>\n But the November 2016 Cybersecurity Law<\/a>\u2014which reflects the same obsession with national security as the new State Security Law<\/a>, the Counterterrorism Law<\/a>, and the Foreign NGO Management Law<\/a>\u2014breaks new ground.<\/p>\n First, it requires a range of companies\u2014including international firms\u2014in China to censor \u201cprohibited\u201d information and restrict online anonymity, including by demanding that companies require users to provide their real name and personal information to use their services. In the past, instant messaging services were exempt from real-name registration requirements, but the new law now changes that.<\/p>\n Second, the law now obliges \u201ccritical information infrastructure operators\u201d to store users\u2019 \u201cpersonal information and other important business data\u201d in China. The scope of this obligation is limited only to data that is related to a firm\u2019s China operations, but the term \u201cimportant business data\u201d is undefined, and companies must still submit to a security assessment if they want to transfer data outside the country. The definition of \u201ccritical information infrastructure\u201d remains vague and could encompass a broad range of companies.<\/p>\n Third, companies now have to monitor and report to the government undefined \u201cnetwork security incidents,\u201d as well as provide undefined \u201ctechnical support\u201d to security agencies to aid in investigations, raising fears of increased surveillance. Network operators must retain network logs for at least six months and accept government \u201csupervision.\u201d<\/p>\n Fourth, the law explicitly prohibits individuals from using the Internet to \u201cendanger national security, advocate terrorism or extremism, [or] propagate ethnic hatred and discrimination,\u201d and \u201coverthrowing the socialist system\u201d and \u201cfabricating or spreading false information to disturb economic order.\u201d It also bans the use of the Internet \u201cto incite separatism or damage national unity.\u201d These crimes, some codified in criminal law, are regularly used to punish and jail peaceful activists and can result in lengthy sentences.<\/p>\n Finally, Article 46 of the final draft also prohibits individuals or groups from establishing \u201cwebsites and communication groups\u201d that are used for \u201cspreading criminal methods\u201d or \u201cother information related to unlawful and criminal activities.\u201d But as critical stories or protest are regularly criminalized in China, this article may encourage further self-censorship on social media.<\/p>\n The law does incorporate privacy protections for users regarding how private companies must safeguard their personal data or notify them of potential breaches or security vulnerabilities. However, the law fails to impose adequate protections for the right to privacy where security agencies monitor networks, investigate cybercrime, or access data held by companies.<\/p>\n While many of these measures are not new, most were previously only informally applied or defined in lower-level regulation. Elevating these powers in the Cybersecurity Law sends a signal that the government may enforce the requirements more strictly, leaving less leeway for tech companies to avoid implementation. <\/p>\n While many states are debating cybersecurity legislation, China\u2019s law should be viewed within a legal framework, where threats to \u201cinformation security\u201d are defined broadly enough to include sharing information that diverges from official narratives, and where \u201cpreserving Internet sovereignty\u201d is the overarching goal.<\/p>\n Why adopt such a law, especially when heavy-handed restrictions already existed for users and companies alike? Presumably Beijing wishes to create a veneer of legal legitimacy when it imprisons on-line critics or shuts down companies, and to extend into the digital realm sufficient uncertainty about what might or might not be legal to fuel self-censorship. As a government deeply hostile to the freedom of expression, privacy, and other human rights that protect on-line peaceful speech, Beijing has made its intentions ominously clear. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Do Chinese authorities need more laws to surveil people? From the earliest days of the Chinese Communist Party, authorities have kept the closest of eyes on all behavior for signs of dissent. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3227,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-3228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3228\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3228"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iuhrdf.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=3228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}