PBS Interviews Three Falun Gong Practitioners On The Issues Of Internet Censorship In China

PBS Interviews Three Falun Gong Practitioners On The Issues of Internet Censorship In China (audio)

This is China In-Depth for Sound of Hope Radio, focusing on what’s going on today with its ruler Chinese Communist Party (CCP). On April 18, 2006, PBS NewsHour Correspondent Spencer Michaels interviewed with Falun Gong practitioners on the issue of Chinese Internet Censorship. Let’s take a glimpse at their conversation.

In a cluttered apartment in Northern California, a Chinese-born computer scientist, who doesn’t want his identity revealed, is waging a technological war on the Chinese government. He is working to improve a software program he designed that people in China can use to get around their government’s Internet censorship. The technology, which masks the Web sites visited, is called Ultrareach. It uses both encryption and a constantly changing computer identification that allows access to banned Web sites. The founder says he is afraid Chinese agents could find him and try to silence him.
“Yes, those Web sites are usually now blocked. We invented a technology that can breakthrough China’s great firewall so that it enables Internet users in China, can visit any Web sites from the United States or from other free world. I don’t think China government likes it. You know, they see the Internet as a threat in the freedom of the information expression.”

Have they threatened you personally? Asked the PBS NewsHour Correspondent. “One of my partners Peter Yuan Li, actually, got beaten up at his home Atlanta, and computers were taken away. I don’t think they have found me yet.” Says the anonymous Chinese-born computer scientist.

Reporter Spencer Michaels continue saying that in China itself, the Internet is booming. Even nightclubs boast Web connections. One hundred and fifteen million Chinese go online only to find that the government uses filters to block sites that provide information about democracy or the uprising in Tiananmen Square or dissident groups. In order to get around those restrictions, more than 100,000 Chinese use Ultrareach under other technologies every day, which in turn has led authorities to fight back, inventing new technologies and buying foreign programs to foil the anti-censorship software. On the Berkeley campus of the University of California, Xiao Qing directs the China Internet Project and advocates for a freer Internet policy. She says the Chinese government encourages the use of the Internet for its economic benefits in a global economy. Xiao Qing also says On the one hand, we see this very rapid development of the Internet infrastructure, the practices. And on the other hand, we also see these unprecedented, enormous resources being put into the control, the filtering, the monitoring, the censorship, surveillance, what we call altogether China’s great firewall.

Frederick Wakeman, professor of history and Asian studies at Berkeley says the Chinese have a millennial tradition of censorship and of literary inquisition. The Chinese have long tried to limit information, and rebels have always tried to circumvent censorship. He thought the Internet might changes things. Fred has this to say “I think, when it first appeared, we thought, well, this is going to open up channels of communication that the Chinese themselves cannot control. I can remember, back in the days when the fax machine was first introduced, and I would send a fax from Peking, and there would be a Chinese security officer at my elbow to make sure the fax was secure. They had enough manpower to do that. Now, they obviously are trying to extend that into the area of the Internet, which is much more difficult. The Chinese will find ways to get around it.”

PBS NewsHour Correspondent further commented on the following: For now, the Chinese are keeping the pressure on. They are requiring that Internet companies operating in China, like Google, Microsoft, Cisco and Yahoo, keep Chinese users from forbidden sites. Google’s announcement in January that it would play by the Chinese rules, eliminating offending Web sites on its Chinese service, provoked a storm of criticism, led by Republican Congressman Christopher Smith. Here is Christopher Smith’s statement: “Google.cn. China’s search engine, is guaranteed to take you to the virtual land of deceit, disinformation and the big lie.” In Beijing last week, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt defended his company by saying “We’ve made a decision that we have to respect their local law and culture. So it’s not an option for us to broadly make information available that’s illegal, or inappropriate, or immoral, or what have you.”

Practitioners of Falun Gong, a Chinese spiritual exercise purporting to improve the body and spirit, are among those protesting the loudest. They say the Chinese government has banned the practice, jailed and allegedly tortured some members, and banished Falun Gong from the Internet. Conseqently, members have condemned American companies for complying with Chinese demands for self-censorship. California chemist and software developer Sherry Zhang, a Falun Gong practitioner, is helping Ultrareach in working to attack the Chinese firewall, which she says also blocks information coming out of China. Sherry Zhang says: “I’m a scientist, but I’m actually, because of a persecution in China, so I get involved in the Internet project, because the Chinese government is trying to block the internet, trying to block all this information the persecution of Falun Gong and et cetera, human rights abuse and et cetera, is trying to block it from coming out of China. “ Sherry Zhang also related what happened to an American friend of hers in China. “He went to an Internet bar, just typed in two words, “Falun Gong.” Instantly, the sirens went off. And then the police came in front of him within one minute. So that’s how bad it is. Because they have the ways to monitor what people are doing on the Internet, especially in the Internet bar.”

PBS NewsHour Correspondent says that the Chinese employ at least 30,000 Internet police. And according to human rights groups, between 42 and 87 people have been jailed for Internet crimes. Berkeley’s Xiao Qiang says it is not just Falun Gong members who are benefiting from the new software. “Once people are using this software, they don’t just come to the Falun Gong sites. They see every other sites that they couldn’t see inside of China, which is really helping expending the scope of information in China.” Several dissidents, including Sherry Zhang, say a united front by American companies could force the Chinese to back down. “I think the solution for the whole business community, to really know that it’s not that they need China, but China needs them, too. They need to stick to all of us in the international business community, to stick to our principles, you know, the freedom and the democracy, and that way we can slowly force China to change, rather than China changing us.” Xiao Qiang says that high-tech, combined with high principles, should eventually prevail. “Most importantly is those companies also know, if they fight against the censorship mechanism, they are on the right side of history. They’re also on the right side of technologies. Ultimately, it’s the Chinese people wants to have a freer Internet, a freer society. And the great firewall, no matter how great it is, it just is like the Great Wall in China. It’s not going to stop the history going towards a freer, more human society in China.”

Finally, PBS NewsHour Correspondent Spencer Michaels commented that While much of Great Wall remains standing after 2,000 years, parts have crumbled, Xiang Qiang expects much of the great firewall to crumble as well, in a country where repression has always been part of the landscape.

This was China In-Depth for Sound of Hope Radio. I am Catherine Hennessy