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New Chinese Regulations Require Real Name On Internet
mpicpp sends word that starting March 1st, China will ban internet accounts that impersonate people or organizations, and will require that people use real names when registering accounts online. "As part of an effort to increase control over the Internet, China's government this week revealed new regulations that require Web users to register their real names. According to The Wall Street Journal, the rules apply to users of blogs, microblogs, instant messaging services, online discussion forums, news comment sections, and other related services. Beginning March 1, China will also ban Web accounts that impersonate people or organizations, Reuters said. That includes groups posing as government entities—the People's Daily state newspaper—and impersonations of foreign leaders, like President Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin."
after every post
already A. Nonymous Coward.
Cue the "if you don't use your real name - you must be a terrorist" angle from the politicians
That would be nice, considering that Google has abandoned that policy entirely.
Facebook, on the other hand, seems to be stepping up the enforcement of their real name policy.
85 percent of the billion plus people populace uses one of a hundred surnames, and for common given names there's a couple dozen popular ones for male and for female........LOTS of people have the same name. "Hi I'm Tang Li!" "how about that, we've ten other ones in the class this year!"
The idea has been floated in the US before. It would probably fail at the Supreme Court level as freedom of speech includes the right to speak anonymously.
See, when hacking off Linux lovers, anon is coward. When in these other countries, anon is brave.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
People don't have "real" names. We are not born with a unique ID burned into our souls; there is no primary key for you in the CosmosDB. Names are what people refer to each other by. My name could as easily be Big Brother as Zheng Wu, both are just as valid. To be entirely too pedantic this OP should have used the term Official Name, i.e. the name the state uses to refer to you in governmental matters.
Yep, I was just about to say, that as much as we in the US bash China for lack of privacy and personal rights (including the right 'not to be seen')....there are a lot in the US government (fed and state) just salivating over ending anonymous access to the internet just as much as the Chinese.
The internet really snuck in under the radar of most governments, and Lord knows..if it came in to being today, it would not be nearly what we see today.
Slowly but surely, I fear the US will follow suit and require registration to log on, regulation....and an end to what has so far proven to be a very valuable means of freely expressing one's self and speaking out against issues that matter.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
s/Google/Facebook/gi;
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
...says AC.
CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
Yep, I was just about to say, that as much as we in the US bash China for lack of privacy and personal rights (including the right 'not to be seen')....there are a lot in the US government (fed and state) just salivating over ending anonymous access to the internet just as much as the Chinese.
Have you not been paying attention? The 'real names' thing was invented here. Except it was started by the private sector, not government.
Before you claim there's any difference between the two, I will direct you to The Dangers of Surveillance, a paper that first appeared in the Harvard Law Review, and is required reading for anyone who's interested in the legal principles at play here. I too used to think, 'Yeah, but you can walk away from a business, but you can't walk away from government.' The paper makes an excellent point that real name policies, no matter where they originate, are detrimental to human liberty:
[W]e must recognize that surveillance transcends the public-private divide. Even if we are ultimately more concerned with government surveillance, any solution must grapple with the complex relationships between government and corporate watchers.
In a nutshell, if a corporation has your data, then by hook or by crook, the government can get it too, often voluntarily, often in circumvention of the law.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
Erm... you might want to check out which countries have "pervasive" internet censorship and surveillance before you start throwing stones at China: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Oh, and which country is currently assassinating foreigners in foreign countries outside of declared war zones? And imprisoning people indefinitely without charge or trial? And torturing people? And has the highest number of people in prolonged solitary confinement, where “Psychological effects can include anxiety, depression, anger, cognitive disturbances, perceptual distortions, obsessive thoughts, paranoia, and psychosis.”?
Oh wait, wrong country.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
I work at a company with ~1000 employees in Beijing. Over 80 of them have the last name "Wang"
But after we get gender equity, we'll get that closer to 50 percent.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Hmm, soon they tell me my cat can't have a facebook account. He is registered with his real name there, so it should be ok. Even the profile picture is a real one and not a fake. I do help him with typing and forming opinions, as he is a cat, and doesn't type so coherently. And his opinions mostly circle around chasing things, killing things, and dragging this he killed to me. And eating. And licking himself. And destroying furniture. He does follow IKEA, you know, to keep in touch with what kind of furniture might be coming his way.