Chinese Internet Users Lose Access to WeChat
BY LIZA LIN
Chinese censors are crippling access to the country’s do-everything app for some users as part of a campaign to quell discussion of a rare protest in Beijing, an escalation in the Communist Party’s drive to cleanse the country’s internet of even the whiff of dissent.
The crackdown came after two banners condemning Chinese leader Xi Jinping were hung from a busy highway bridge in the Chinese capital Thursday—a rare act of defiance in the seat of Communist Party power that captivated the country’s social-media users. Hours after images of the banners began to circulate online, many users reported losing access to WeChat, a super app that has become virtually indispensable for daily life in China.
Hundreds of complaints posted in a customer-service forum run by WeChat’s owner, Tencent Holdings Ltd., indicated the suspensions were imposed after users posted or reposted images of the protest. Some users offered desperate, if somewhat circumspect, apologies. One user referred to “an incident this afternoon,” and apologized for engaging in damaging behavior. “Please, I have been using this account for 10 years, with many messages and pictures—very precious to me,” the user wrote.
Some curious internet users asked to see the images many were alluding to. “You’d be better off knowing nothing about them,” one user responded.
By Friday evening, Tencent’s customer-services forum on Weibo, a Twitter-like social-media platform, was no longer accessible. Many users turned to a general forum run by Tencent to continue their petitions.
Neither Tencent nor Beijing’s Public Security bureau responded to requests for comment. Thursday’s protest, which depicted Mr. Xi as a “traitorous dictator,” was small but still shocking in a country where the space for dissent has shrunk almost to zero in recent years. The act of defiance was especially noteworthy for occurring in Beijing, the country’s most tightly managed city, just days before a pivotal Communist Party gathering where Mr. Xi is all but certain
to claim a norm-breaking third term as leader. Even before Thursday’s incident, Chinese authorities tightened their grip around online discourse to an unusual degree. An examination by The Wall Street Journal found the country’s most popular social-media platforms had been scrubbed of independent or negative content concerning Mr. Xi and many of the country’s other top officials, making it essentially impossible to gauge public opinion of the party’s leadership.
Authorities’ response to the protest online was swift and broad. Eric Liu, a former social- media censor in China who now works as an analyst with the censorship-focused website China Digital Times, said he wasn’t aware of such a large-scale locking of WeChat accounts in recent years. For a WeChat user, the effect of losing access to the app can be significant. Hundreds of millions of Chinese use the app not just to keep in touch with family and friends but to hail taxis, buy train tickets, pay for groceries and manage their investments. One Beijing-based user said he had shared a photo of the banners hanging off Beijing’s Sitong Bridge beneath a column of black smoke in a WeChat group of about 70 people just after 1 p.m. He offered no comment, he said, and neither did other users, though some responded with emojis. Around 5 p.m., the user said, he received a notice from WeChat saying that his account had been restricted because he violated Chinese law and that the restriction wouldn’t be lifted. He said he was able to access the app’s digital-payments feature, but was cut off from all of its social functions.
“I was shocked when they told me my account was permanently suspended,” he said.
BY LIZA LIN
Chinese censors are crippling access to the country’s do-everything app for some users as part of a campaign to quell discussion of a rare protest in Beijing, an escalation in the Communist Party’s drive to cleanse the country’s internet of even the whiff of dissent.
The crackdown came after two banners condemning Chinese leader Xi Jinping were hung from a busy highway bridge in the Chinese capital Thursday—a rare act of defiance in the seat of Communist Party power that captivated the country’s social-media users. Hours after images of the banners began to circulate online, many users reported losing access to WeChat, a super app that has become virtually indispensable for daily life in China.
Hundreds of complaints posted in a customer-service forum run by WeChat’s owner, Tencent Holdings Ltd., indicated the suspensions were imposed after users posted or reposted images of the protest. Some users offered desperate, if somewhat circumspect, apologies. One user referred to “an incident this afternoon,” and apologized for engaging in damaging behavior. “Please, I have been using this account for 10 years, with many messages and pictures—very precious to me,” the user wrote.
Some curious internet users asked to see the images many were alluding to. “You’d be better off knowing nothing about them,” one user responded.
By Friday evening, Tencent’s customer-services forum on Weibo, a Twitter-like social-media platform, was no longer accessible. Many users turned to a general forum run by Tencent to continue their petitions.
Neither Tencent nor Beijing’s Public Security bureau responded to requests for comment. Thursday’s protest, which depicted Mr. Xi as a “traitorous dictator,” was small but still shocking in a country where the space for dissent has shrunk almost to zero in recent years. The act of defiance was especially noteworthy for occurring in Beijing, the country’s most tightly managed city, just days before a pivotal Communist Party gathering where Mr. Xi is all but certain
to claim a norm-breaking third term as leader. Even before Thursday’s incident, Chinese authorities tightened their grip around online discourse to an unusual degree. An examination by The Wall Street Journal found the country’s most popular social-media platforms had been scrubbed of independent or negative content concerning Mr. Xi and many of the country’s other top officials, making it essentially impossible to gauge public opinion of the party’s leadership.
Authorities’ response to the protest online was swift and broad. Eric Liu, a former social- media censor in China who now works as an analyst with the censorship-focused website China Digital Times, said he wasn’t aware of such a large-scale locking of WeChat accounts in recent years. For a WeChat user, the effect of losing access to the app can be significant. Hundreds of millions of Chinese use the app not just to keep in touch with family and friends but to hail taxis, buy train tickets, pay for groceries and manage their investments. One Beijing-based user said he had shared a photo of the banners hanging off Beijing’s Sitong Bridge beneath a column of black smoke in a WeChat group of about 70 people just after 1 p.m. He offered no comment, he said, and neither did other users, though some responded with emojis. Around 5 p.m., the user said, he received a notice from WeChat saying that his account had been restricted because he violated Chinese law and that the restriction wouldn’t be lifted. He said he was able to access the app’s digital-payments feature, but was cut off from all of its social functions.
“I was shocked when they told me my account was permanently suspended,” he said.
