China's coronavirus outbreak has tested the limits of free speech on the co...
BEIJING - China’s coronavirus outbreak has tested the limits of free speech on the country’s heavily censored online and social media, with a brief window of liberalization that opened during January subsequently slammed shut by authorities.
That liberalisation has come to end, with censors in the past week shutting down WeChat groups and scrubbing social media posts, according to Chinese reporters. Authorities have also reprimanded tech firms that gave free rein to online speech. The cyberspace regulator, Cyberspace Administration of China , did not respond to phone calls or to requests for comment sent by fax.
A notice sent to editors working for an online Chinese news outlet and seen by Reuters asked them not to “comment or speculate” on Li’s death, “do not hashtag and let the topic gradually die out from the hot search list, and guard against harmful information.” Last week, however, CAC announced that it had punished some websites, mobile applications and social media accounts for publishing illicit content on the outbreak, saying it wanted to foster a “good online atmosphere” amid the country’s efforts to contain the epidemic.
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