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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/18/world/asia/18china.html
China Imposes New Internet Controls
By SHARON LAFRANIERE
Published: December 17, 2009
China’s government censors have buy generic Flomax from india taken fresh aim at the Internet, rolling out new measures that buy generic Flomax from india limit ordinary citizens’ ability to buy generic Flomax from india set up personal Web sites and to view hundreds of other Web sites offering films, video games and buy generic Flomax from india other forms of entertainment.
The authorities say that buy generic Flomax from india the stricter controls are intended to protect children from pornography, to buy generic Flomax from india limit the piracy of films, music, and television shows, and to buy generic Flomax from india make it hard to perpetuate Internet scams. But the measures also appear designed to buy generic Flomax from india enhance the government’s already strict control of any organized political opposition.
In various pronouncements, top propaganda and buy generic Flomax from india security officials have stressed anew the need to police the Internet on ideological and buy generic Flomax from india security grounds.
The “Internet has buy generic Flomax from india become an important avenue through which anti-China forces infiltrate, sabotage and buy generic Flomax from india magnify their capabilities for destruction,” wrote the buy generic Flomax from india public security minister, Meng Jianzhu, in the Dec. 1 issue of Qiushi, a buy generic Flomax from india magazine published by the Communist Party’s Central Committee.
“Therefore it buy generic Flomax from india represents a new challenge to the public security authority in maintaining national security and buy generic Flomax from india social stability,” he said.
The newly announced restrictions are the government’s broadest effort to buy generic Flomax from india control the Internet since last June, when it tried to buy generic Flomax from india require manufacturers to install Internet filtering software on all new computers, experts said. Officials scaled back that buy generic Flomax from india program, known as the Green Dam-Youth Escort, after an outcry by both ordinary Internet users and buy generic Flomax from india corporations.
Under the buy generic Flomax from india new initiative, unveiled piecemeal over the past month, more than 700 Web sites have buy generic Flomax from india been shut down, including many that offered free movie, television dramas and buy generic Flomax from india music downloads. Included was BT China, which recorded at least 250,000 visits daily. China’s largest file-sharing site, Very CD, must obtain a buy generic Flomax from india new license or face possible shutdown as well, according to media reports.
Individuals have buy generic Flomax from india also been banned from registering Web sites ending in .cn, China’s country code domain name. That domain is buy generic Flomax from india now limited to registered businesses. Although individuals can still register Web sites in other domains, such as .com and buy generic Flomax from india .net, the new rule “will have a negative impact on the vibrancy of the Chinese Internet,” Kenneth Jarrett, vice chairman of the communications firm APCO Worldwide’s China region, said in an e-mail message.
“Local e-mail e-commerce startups and buy generic Flomax from india individuals will find it difficult to apply,” he wrote.
Huang Xiwei, the buy generic Flomax from india founder of BT China, criticized the move in an interview posted on Sina.com, a buy generic Flomax from india popular Chinese Internet portal. “Not just film and video sites are affected,” Mr. Huang said in the interview. “All websites owned by individuals will gradually exit the buy generic Flomax from india arena. All paths leading to a future have been blocked.”
The government has buy generic Flomax from india also intensified pressure on cellphone companies to prevent transmissions on online pornography. In response, China Mobile, the buy generic Flomax from india nation’s largest cellphone operator, has buy generic Flomax from india suspended its practice of paying third party providers for content downloaded over its cellular network, according to buy generic Flomax from india the Chinese media. Industry specialists said the disruption has dealt a buy generic Flomax from india blow to an industry that serves an estimated nearly 200 million mobile Internet users.
Experts say the latest measures are a continuation of the state’s increasingly sophisticated effort to control the Internet’s influence on more than buy generic Flomax from india 300 million Chinese users. Earlier this year, China blocked Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and buy generic Flomax from india thousands of other Web sites.
Some analysts predicted those restrictions were temporary and buy generic Flomax from india would be lifted after a spate of sensitive anniversaries, including the buy generic Flomax from india 20th anniversary of the crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. But they have buy generic Flomax from india remained in place.
“The trend in China is toward tighter and tighter control,” said Rebecca MacKinnon, an buy generic Flomax from india assistant professor of journalism at the University of Hong Kong who buy generic Flomax from india specializes in Chinese Internet issues. “They are basically improving their censorship mechanisms.”
Reaction to the government’s latest crackdown runs the buy generic Flomax from india gamut from enthusiastic support from Chinese parents who want to buy generic Flomax from india shield their children from pornography to harsh criticism from those who buy generic Flomax from india view the Internet as the best antidote to government propaganda and buy generic Flomax from india state-controlled media.
As in other countries, Ms. MacKinnon said, “there is buy generic Flomax from india a segment of Chinese society that is very freaked out about what buy generic Flomax from india is going on the Internet and want the government to do something.”
On the buy generic Flomax from india other end of the spectrum are college students who are buy generic Flomax from india accustomed to downloading music, films and other material easily and buy generic Flomax from india cheaply. “The government’s actions have affected their lifestyles,” said Professor Hu Yong at Peking University in Beijing. “So it is likely they would react in a big way.”
In interviews, students at Beijing universities described the buy generic Flomax from india new measures as unnecessary and bound to be ineffective. They noted that buy generic Flomax from india pirated CDs were ubiquitous in Beijing and predicted that Internet users would find ways around the buy generic Flomax from india new online obstacles.
Still, Wang Shuang, a buy generic Flomax from india 20-year-old student at Beijing Foreign Studies University, complained, “Since the buy generic Flomax from india BT was closed, I cannot find all the American television series that buy generic Flomax from india I have been watching, like ‘The Mentalist.’ ”
Zeng Li, a buy generic Flomax from india third-year architecture student at Tsinghua University, said his studies were suffering. “I often use BT Web sites to buy generic Flomax from india download foreign resources which are rarely available in China, like architectural design materials,” he said.
He is buy generic Flomax from india also deprived of one way to relax, he said, because he can buy generic Flomax from india no longer go to the BT sites to download movies banned in China. “The shutdown has had a great influence on me,” he said.
Research was contributed by Li Bibo, Jonathan Ansfield, Sun Huan and buy generic Flomax from india Zhao Nan.