Internet Filtering in China in 2004-2005: A Country Study

Internet Filtering in China in 2004-2005: A Country Study

"1 The OpenNet Initiative is a collaborative partnership between three leading academic institutions: the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School, and the Advanced Network Research Group at the Cambridge Security Programme (Centre for International Studies) at the University of Cambridge. As with all OpenNet Initiative work, these reports represent a large team effort. The work of principal investigators Jonathan L. Zittrain and John G. Palfrey, Jr. on this research report was made possible by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Research and Writing Grants Program of the Program on Global Security and Sustainability. ONI thanks Che Dong, Alana Maurushat, Rebecca Vaughn, and a number of anonymous volunteers for contributing key research to this study."

Check the Table of Contents. What follows are an excerpt from the Executive Summary and one excerpt on Google Cache Testing (58). Link and download the .pdf for the whole report. Very informative.

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1

China’s Internet filtering regime is the most sophisticated effort of its kind in the world. Compared to similar efforts in other states, China’s filtering regime is pervasive, sophisticated, and effective. It comprises multiple levels of legal regulation and technical control. It involves numerous state agencies and thousands of public and private personnel. It censors content transmitted through multiple methods, including Web pages, Web logs, on-line discussion forums, university bulletin board systems, and e-mail messages. Our testing found efforts to prevent access to a wide range of sensitive materials, from pornography to religious material to political dissent. ONI sought to determine the degree to which China filters sites on topics that the Chinese government finds sensitive, and found that the state does so extensively. Chinese citizens seeking access to Web sites containing content related to Taiwanese and Tibetan independence, Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama, the Tiananmen Square incident, opposition political parties, or a variety of anti-Communist movements will frequently find themselves blocked. [. . . . ]

Unlike the filtering systems in many other countries, China’s filtering regime appears to be carried out at various control points and also to be dynamic, changing along a variety of axes over time. . . . Cybercafés, which provide an important source of access to the Internet for many Chinese, are required by law to track Internet usage by customers and to keep correlated information on file for 60 days. As a further indication of the complexity of China’s filtering regime, we found several instances where particular URLs were blocked but the top-level domain of these URLs was accessible, despite the fact that the source of content appeared consistent across the domain – suggesting that filtering may be conducted at a finer level in China than in the other countries that we have studied closely. Moreover, China’s Internet filtering appears to have grown more refined, sophisticated, and targeted during the years of ONI’s testing.

[. . . . ] China operates the most extensive, technologically sophisticated, and broad-reaching system of Internet filtering in the world. The implications of this distorted on-line information environment for China’s users are profound, and disturbing.

Another excerpt:

[. . . . ] H. Google Cache Testing

Google is one of the most popular search engines for users worldwide. Google’s cache function, though, allows users to access (at least intermittently) filtered content, because the request for that material goes to Google’s servers, not to the blocked source’s servers.169 Concerned by this circumvention method, China temporarily blocked access to Google in September 2002170; requests for Google’s site were redirected to Chinese search engines.171 According to the company, Google negotiated with Chinese officials, and eventually access was restored.172

However, we found that while Google’s site is accessible to Chinese users,173 the Google cache174 and certain keyword searches are blocked.

Download the whole report and read it. Extensively documented