Tag: Social media

Without a Covid Narrative, China’s Censors Are Not Sure What to Do

Chin@Strategy

Since China dropped its strict “zero Covid” policy, a joke has been making the rounds on social media about the sudden shift. Three men who don’t know each other sit in a prison cell. Each explains why he was arrested:“I opposed Covid testing.”“I supported Covid testing.”“I conducted Covid testing.” The joke has yet to be broadly censored. It is a sign of just how much the Chinese Communist Party, usually a master of messaging, is struggling to come up with a coherent explanation for the policy shift and a clear…

Bans on TikTok Gain Momentum in Washington and States

Chin@Strategy

The Biden administration has negotiated with TikTok for two years to resolve the government’s concerns that the popular Chinese-owned video app poses a national security risk. But as talks drag on, state and federal lawmakers have become impatient and taken matters into their own hands. In the past several weeks, at least 14 states have banned TikTok on government-issued devices. In Congress, lawmakers are expected to vote this week on a sweeping spending bill that includes a ban of TikTok on all federal government devices. A separate bipartisan bill, which…

Traumatized by Covid, but Ruled by a Party That Never Apologizes

Chin@Strategy

She believed the government’s misinformation about the pandemic in the West, so she supported locking down Shanghai in April, a position she now regrets. Now knowing better, she wants the party to apologize to “all the innocent people who died under ‘zero Covid,’ people who lost their income under lockdowns and all the people who were brainwashed by the propaganda machine,” she said. Like Ms. Zhang, most people I interviewed for this column only want to be identified by a single name for safety concerns. In a normal society, for…

Indiana Sues TikTok for Security and Child Safety Violations

Chin@Strategy

Indiana’s attorney general on Wednesday sued the Chinese-owned app TikTok for deceiving users about China’s access to their data and for exposing children to mature content, in the first state lawsuits against the popular video service. Todd Rokita, the attorney general, claimed that TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, violated state consumer protection laws by failing to disclose the Chinese government’s ability to tap sensitive consumer information. His office said in a separate complaint that TikTok deceived young users and their parents with its age rating of…

China accused of flooding social media with spam to cover up Covid protests

Chin@Strategy

An attempt to flood social media platforms with spam in order to drown out coverage of the lockdown protests in China was probably backed by the Chinese government, according to analysis by a US cybersecurity firm. Recorded Future found that networks of coordinated bot accounts were targeting non-Chinese social media platforms to crowd out genuine posts about the demonstrations with spam content and by hijacking hashtags of names of Chinese cities. It said China’s government was most likely to be behind the tactic. Charity Wright, a senior analyst at Recorded…

From blank paper to alpacas: how protesters in China are voicing their anger – video

Chin@Strategy

The largest protests in a generation erupted in cities across China over the weekend against the government’s zero-Covid policy.  The most widely used symbol in the demonstrations has been a blank sheet of paper. It symbolises censorship, and may also, some Twitter users pointed out, be read as a reference to the deaths last week of 10 people in a building fire in Urumqi, Xinjiang, which was blamed on lockdown restrictions that protesters believe prevented the residents from escaping in time. In China, white is a colour used at funerals. But…

The Long Odds Facing China’s Protesters

Chin@Strategy

Still, without some of China’s elite breaking with Mr. Xi to support the protesters, William Hurst, a Northwestern University scholar, wrote on Twitter, “the most likely scenario I can see is that the protests fizzle out (as most such movements do in most countries).” Understand the Protests in China “Having erupted spontaneously in a short period,” predicted Mr. Hurst, who studies Chinese social movements, “they will fade away without reaching any climax or denouement.” Protests’ Waning Power Throughout most of the 20th century, mass protests seeking a change in government…

Culture secretary says revised online safety bill would still block content of kind seen by Molly Russell – UK politics live

Chin@Strategy

From 2h ago Donelan says revised online safety bill would still block harmful content of kind seen by Molly Russell Here are some more lines from the Michelle Donelan interviews this morning on the changes being made to the online safety bill. Donelan, the culture secretary, said she was removing the “legal but harmful” provisions from the bill (see 9.26am) because they created a “quasi-legal category”. She told Sky News: It had [a] very, very concerning impact, potentially, on free speech. There were unintended consequences associated with it. It was…

Elon Musk Takes on Apple and Its App Store

Chin@Strategy

Leon Black is accused of raping a woman at Jeffrey Epstein’s home in 2002. Cheri Pierson sued Black, the former Apollo Global Management C.E.O., becoming the second woman to publicly accuse him of sexual assault. A lawyer for Mr. Black denied Pierson’s claims and called them an extortion attempt. Bob Iger commits to reining in expenses at Disney. At his first companywide meeting on Monday, the recently rehired Disney C.E.O. said that he would keep a hiring freeze in place and that Disney+ would focus on turning a profit over…

China Regroups to Snuff Out a Wave of Covid Protests

Chin@Strategy

After China experienced its boldest and most widespread protests in decades, defying Xi Jinping, a Communist Party leader who prizes his reputation for ironclad authority, his security apparatus is scrambling to reassert control. Public security personnel and vehicles have blanketed potential protest sites. Police officers are searching some residents’ phones for prohibited apps. Officials are going to the homes of would-be protesters to warn them against illegal activities and are taking some away for questioning. Censors are scrubbing protest symbols and slogans from social media. On Monday, the demonstrations were…