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International Law

: Open and Shut

China blocks me!

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I'm in Hong Kong this week after 15 days in China (fantastic and all that) where I found that access to Open and Shut is blocked.The thought of Chinese officials beavering away to find me in the blogosphere, making sense of my ramblings and then cutting access seems a bit bizarre.

Subversive? Moi?

The explanation would have to be that key word blocks are in place for terms like freedom of information, open government, etc. so I'm not taking the ban personally as either a slight or compliment. But if anyone in China is reading, I'd be glad to hear your side of the story.

This blog will resume something close to normal transmission shortly.

Update: Shane Macleod of the ABC tells me there is a blanket block in China on blogs hosted on Blogspot and similar blog sites. This post by John Prandato refers to China's recent attempts to tighten the grip following the departure of Google (I could use Google in China but selective links were blocked):

Earlier this month, China quietly acknowledged the creation of a new ?Internet news coordination bureau,? officially responsible for ?guidance, coordination and other work related to the construction and management of Web culture.? And just this week, China?s legislature proposed an amendment to the Law on Guarding State Secrets that would require telecommunications companies to ?detect, report and delete? leaks of ?state secrets,? broadly defined by the government as ?information concerning national security and interests that, if released, would harm the country?s security and interests.? These measures are just the latest pieces fastened to a massive regulatory system, much to the chagrin of the international human rights community and many of China?s 400 million Internet users.

Prandato (and Macleod) mention that net savvy locals get around the block problem through virtual private networks, but two weeks enjoying other things there meant I never came close to this solution.

Full post as published by Open and Shut on May 01, 2010 (boomark / email).