Chinas wechat monitors foreign users to refine censorship at. Aug 29, 2019 according to the citizen lab, an internet watchdog group at the university of toronto, wechat s parent company tencent created an extraordinarily advanced censorship algorithm to automatically. Some censored terms referred to information that was later made official, such as the fact that the virus was contagious. Wechat implements censorship for users with accounts registered to. Citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays report that wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing. Mar 04, 2020 it meant that users of apps such as tencents wechat and joyys yy video streaming app were unable to talk about the spread of the disease, wrote torontobased cyber research group citizen labin a. We document the search filtering on weibo, chinas twitterlike service, as well as keyword and image censorship on wechat, the most popular chat app in china. China censors wechat without users realizing by focusing on. Previous work has found that wechat placed images which are sent by chinaregistered accounts under two different kinds of surveillance. Our research on wechat censorship uses sample testing to determine what type of content, such as words, urls, and images, can be communicated over the platform and which content is censored.
A new report from the university of torontos citizen lab describes an unsuccessful phishing. Wechat is a social communications app that connects you to the people you care about and to services that enhance your daily life. Research group citizen lab finds wechat screens overseas users for sensitive content, which it then bars from being received by chinese. Wechat is monitoring files sent by international users to. Much better, much more popular, much more userfriendly usa today. Wechat surveils international accounts to decide what to censor for. May 08, 2020 citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays report that wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing to censorship. According to a study from citizen lab, a research body from the. Citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays report that wechat users outside of china are thus. Wechat users in china have come up with creative ways to circumvent censorship. A user with a china account l attempts to send a politically sensitive image in a wechat group chat from citizen lab testing conducted in january 2017. Content they share that censors deem inappropriate is thus barred from being seen by users inside china. Citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays report that wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing to censorship.
Masashi cretenishihata is research manager at the citizen lab, munk. Terms relating to the coronavirus were first censored on wechat, chinas most popular messaging app, on january 1, and on livestreaming site yy on december 31, citizen lab said. U of ts citizen lab exposes censorship on popular chat app. Chinese app wechat messages sent outside china are censored. Since 2011, it has transformed from a messaging tool to an allinone super portal, with more than 900 million monthly active users. The wechat, which is the most famous messaging app of china, has stopped informing its users about censoring their messages in a single move which leads to big erosion in the privacy, as per the report from citizen lab shows. Researchers of the university of torontos security research group citizen lab have determined that wechat screens documents and images people share through the platform when using phone number not registered in china.
The app, with over 1 billion monthly active users worldwide, is known to censor its users in china to ensure content falls within topics deemed. The app uses this remote server that conducts the surveillance process, without giving any signs to endusers, according to citizen lab. Wechats realtime censorship system uses hash indexes to filter content the filtering systems also censor content that are not critical of the chinese government. In a citizen lab report published thursday, evidence from our. Wechat, the popular messaging app operated by tencent, uses various md5 hash indexes to censor content in realtime, according to findings released by. Zoom adds extrump adviser, tech lobbyist to pr push. Citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays reportthat wechat users outside of china are thus boston ap documents and images shared by users outside china on wechat, the countrys most popular social media platform, are being monitored and cataloged for use in political censorship in ch. Apr 29, 2017 citizen lab searched the methodology followed by the chinese government to censor chats and discussions made on wechat, which is a famous messaging app. Wechat content outside china used for censorship 106.
Wechat content outside china used for censorship kvia. Wechat, the most popular social media platform in china, has over one billion monthly active users. Dec 02, 2016 users of wechat, chinas most popular messaging app, are having conversations secretly censored without their knowledge, according to a new report from citizen lab. Users of wechat, chinas most popular messaging app, are having conversations secretly censored without their knowledge, according to a new report from citizen lab. The university of torontos citizen lab claimed that wechat monitors the messages of international users to feed content into censorship algorithms in china. Apr, 2017 this report analyzes the information control practices related to a national crackdown on chinese rights lawyers and activists on two leading chinese social media networks. We downloaded the following policies which applied to nonchina. How to avoid getting your wechat messages censored both in. Dec 01, 2016 a new study from the citizen lab, a research group at the university of toronto, reveals that censorship on wechat occurs primarily in group chats rather than oneonone chats between two people. Wechat content outside china used for censorship wsavtv. China censored news of coronavirus for weeks, censored terms. Citizen lab has revealed that wechat, the popular messaging app operated by tencent, subjects the same pervasive content surveillance to.
May 07, 2020 citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays report that wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing to censorship. Tencents messaging app wechat now available for cars zdnet. Download pdf morgan marquisboire and seth hardy, syrian activists targeted with blackshades spy software, citizen lab research report no. May 07, 2020 on may 7 2020, the citizen lab published a report that documents how wechat the most popular social app in china conducts surveillance of images and files shared on the platform and uses the monitored content to train censorship algorithms. Citizen lab states in the report that wechat may be using md5 hash a form of digital signature to help its servers recognise sensitive content.
Wechat the most popular chat app in china uses two different algorithms to filter images in moments. Jul 16, 2019 wechat uses censorship mechanisms to screen images sent between users in onetoone and group chats, according to research from the university of torontos citizen lab. View of chat program censorship and surveillance in china. Citizen lab says nonchina registered accounts used to beef up. Wechat monitors foreigners chats to feed its chinese. Wechat filters images related to rights lawyer crackdown by samuel wade apr, 2017. May 07, 2020 boston documents and images shared by users outside china on wechat, the countrys most popular social media platform, are being monitored and cataloged for use in political censorship in china, a new report says. This report analyzes the information control practices related to a national crackdown on chinese rights lawyers and activists on two leading chinese social media networks. A tencent spokesperson said that the company takes the citizen lab s research seriously and all content shared by the international users of wechat is private. Wechat messenger no longer tells users for censoring their. Citizen lab says nonchina registered accounts used to beef up wechat censorship 4 minutes ago by asha barbaschow in security australian government releases outline for 5g allocation of 850mhz and 900mhz in 2021. A screenshot from citizen labs research shows wechat censorship of an image representing nobel peace prize laureate liu xiaobos.
International users of chinese messaging app wechat could be helping the platform tighten its censorship system for users inside china, according to the latest report by digital watchdog citizen lab. Previous citizen lab research shows the balancing act wechat must. Therefore, if surveillance is present on the application it is likely being performed by a remote server and its effects are not visible outside that server. Wechat monitors files shared by international users to bolster. Wechat monitors files shared by international users to. Citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays reportthat wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing to censorship. May 09, 2020 a tencent spokesperson said that the company takes the citizen lab s research seriously and all content shared by the international users of wechat is private.
May 07, 2020 citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays reportthat wechat users outside of china are thus boston ap documents and images shared by users outside china on wechat, the countrys most popular social media platform, are being monitored and cataloged for use in political censorship in ch. Wechat chinesisch, pinyin weixin winzige nachricht war ursprunglich ein chatdienst. Chinas wechat monitors overseas users to bolster censorship. May 07, 2020 citizen lab, the university of toronto online watchdog, says in thursdays reportthat wechat users outside of china are thus unwittingly contributing to censorship. For a period of more than a year and a half, we downloaded and decrypted the. Wechat is a messaging and calling app that allows you to easily connect with family and friends across. Wechat allegedly surveilled foreign users to refine. We have studied what categorical content wechat generally filters in addition to what content wechat filters in response to specific events. May 10, 2020 the university of torontos citizen lab claimed that wechat monitors the messages of international users to feed content into censorship algorithms in china.
Citizen lab searched the methodology followed by the chinese government to censor chats and discussions made on wechat, which is a famous. Citizen lab says nonchina registered accounts used to beef up wechat censorship 4 minutes ago by asha barbaschow in security australian government releases outline for 5g. That would bar the content they share that censors deem inappropriate from being seen by users inside china. Wechat uses censorship mechanisms to screen images sent between users in onetoone and group chats, according to research from the university of torontos citizen lab. How unwitting users of wechat aid the chinese messaging apps. This document provides a summary of the research findings and questions and answers from the research team. China has been censoring coronavirus information for months. Wechat content outside china used for censorship wsav. Foreigners messages, content on wechat reportedly monitored. Aug 15, 2018 wechat users in china have come up with creative ways to circumvent censorship. Wechat is an enormously popular application owned by chinabased tech giant tencent, used by more than 1 billion people worldwide. In an interview with the daily dot, citizen lab research manager masashi cretenishihata commented on the challenges tibetans face in using social media and other online tools to spread content considered politically sensitive by the chinese government. Citizen lab, spoofing the european parliament, citizen lab research report no. According to the citizen lab, an internet watchdog group at the university of toronto, wechats parent company tencent created an.
Citizen lab says nonchina registered accounts used to beef up wechat censorship. Jul 17, 2019 wechat, the popular messaging app operated by tencent, uses various md5 hash indexes to censor content in realtime, according to findings released by canadian research group citizen lab on monday. Apr 04, 2017 the wechat, which is the most famous messaging app of china, has stopped informing its users about censoring their messages in a single move which leads to big erosion in the privacy, as per the report from citizen lab shows. It meant that users of apps such as tencents wechat and joyys yy video streaming app were unable to talk about the spread of the disease, wrote. Simple enough that anyone can use it, versatile enough that everyone has some use for it wired.
Evidence of image censorship in a wechat group chat from citizen lab testing conducted in january 2017. May 09, 2020 a user with a china account l attempts to send a politically sensitive image in a wechat group chat from citizen lab testing conducted in january 2017. If the server recognises the content as politically sensitive, it adds a digital signature in the form of an md5 hash, to flag that file so that it can be kept away from chinaregistered users. Wechat is the most popular social media app in china. U of ts citizen lab exposes censorship on popular chat app, wechat wechat is the most popular chat app in china photo by jiangang wang via getty researchers at the university of torontos citizen lab published a report today that reveals how wechat, the most popular chat app in china, censors content. A tencent spokesperson said that the company takes the citizen labs research seriously and all content shared by the international users of wechat is private. On may 7 2020, the citizen lab published a report that documents how wechat the most popular social app in china conducts surveillance of images and files shared on the platform and uses the monitored content to train censorship algorithms. The university of torontos citizen lab claimed that wechat monitors the messages of international users to feed content into censorship. A new study from the citizen lab, a research group at the university of toronto, reveals that censorship on wechat occurs primarily in group chats. Wechat filters images related to rights lawyer crackdown.
Mar 04, 2020 chinese social media app wechat and livestreaming app yy have been censoring keywords related to the coronavirus since dec. The citizen lab verified that keyword filtering is done on the server side and did not find any evidence of client side filtering or surveillance on wechat. According to the citizen lab, an internet watchdog group at the university of toronto, wechats parent company tencent created an extraordinarily advanced censorship algorithm to. A new report from the university of torontos citizen lab probes censorship on tencents wechat messaging service related to the july 2015 black friday or 709 crackdown, in which. This document provides a summary of the citizen labs wechat surveillance research findings, as well as questions and answers from the. Dec 17, 2017 wechat is the most popular social media app in china.
Coronavirus discussion was banned online as disease began to. Earlier this year, citizen lab discovered that wechat blacklisted over. With wechat, chinese take censorship abroad, study says. How to dodge wechats image censorship, according to citizen. With 846 million active users on wechat, the company scrapes news posts deemed sensitive and blocks private texts containing certain words in. Mar 03, 2020 from the end of december to midfebruary, citizen lab found more than 500 blocked keywords and phrases on wechat which has over one billion active monthly users as well as on livestreaming platform yy.
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