New Chinese OS rules cause paranoia

SINCE A CHINESE southern city has been forced to change over to legitimate Chinese-developed operating systems, new fears have arisen that the authorities are just finding new ways to snoop.

The INQ reported yesterday how the Chinese authorities are pushing Red Flag Linux software on Chinese Internet cafes in order to make them legit, yet US government-funded radio station, Radio Free Asia, thinks this is just a ploy to spy.

Although it seemed as though this was a good idea, it now appears that the Chinese authority is pushing the Red Flag Linux on Internet cafes which have legitimate Windows software.

Radio Free Asia quoted Xiao Qiang, director of the California-based China Internet Project, as saying the new regulations would only help the authorities to undertake heightened surveillance of the cafes.

Chinese people are under obligation to register with their identification cards when they access the Internet from a public service.

Yet even though this is probably one form of monitoring, whether the net is accessed from an Internet cafe or home it is regularly monitored for content which is politically subversive, related to pornography, gambling or any other illegal business.

The Chinese authorities take what they call illegal use of the internet very seriously – many sites are blocked and dozens of Chinese citizens have been arrested for accessing forbidden areas.

It’s no wonder speculations have arisen regarding these new rules on OS used. µ

L'Inq
The Guardian