China-Based Chat Firms Censoring Non-Chinese Messages
The country's government has a long reach
China's largest internet firm, Tencent, is reportedly now censoring messages sent by international users of its popular WeChat service.
The Shenzhen-based web giant, which accrued $US1.8bn in revenues in the last quarter, is one of the few Chinese online companies trying to expand its footprint overseas.
Although its QQ instant messaging service has around 800 million domestic users and its web portal of the same name is one of China's most popular, the Whatsapp-like platform WeChat (or Weixin) is its most prominent product beyond the Middle Kingdom.
It has now emerged that messages sent between users outside China will be blocked when they contain certain words.
Hide Comments (0)
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post commentsMute this user?
Ban this user?
Un-ban this user?
Nuke this user?
Un-nuke this user?
Flag this comment?
Un-flag this comment?