Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

China's VPN Developers Face Crackdown (bbc.com)

Posted by msmash on from the crackdown dept.

China recently launched a crackdown on the use of software which allows users to get around its heavy internet censorship. Now as the BBC reports, developers are facing growing pressure. From the report: The three plain-clothes policemen tracked him down using a web address. They came to his house and demanded to see his computer. They told him to take down the app he was selling on Apple's App Store, and filmed it as it was happening. His crime was to develop and sell a piece of software that allows people to get round the tough restrictions that limit access to the internet in China. A virtual private network (VPN) uses servers abroad to provide a secure link to the internet. It's essential in China if you want to access parts of the outside world like Facebook, Gmail or YouTube, all of which are blocked on the mainland. "They insisted they needed to see my computer," the software developer, who didn't want us to use his name, told us during a phone interview. "I said this is my private stuff. How can you search as you please?" No warrant was produced and when he asked them what law he had violated they didn't say. Initially he refused to co-operate but, fearing detention, he relented. Then they told him what they wanted: "If you take the app off the shelf from Apple's App Store then this will be all over." 'Sorry, I can't help you with that'. Up until a few months ago his was a legal business. Then the government changed the regulations. VPN sellers need a licence now.

13 of 55 comments (clear)

  1. Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I said this is my private stuff. How can you search as you please?

    Um, because you are in China???

    I find it amusing that people in the other parts of the world think that protections afforded citizens of other countries seem to apply to them automatically also.

    China is just a thinly veiled police state so they can search what they like, when they like. That's just the reality of being in China.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And yet, many in the US are now using or considering using VPNs to avoid their own thinly veiled police state. And the cynical will wonder whether those VPN providers have been compromised by their overseers, or by friends of their overseers. Even Tor isn't safe from being compromised by the State.

      Scoff away at those poor naive Chinese citizens.

    2. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by sit1963nz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yeah, its not like the USA will ever demand you unlock your phone at the boarder, demand you hand over what your social web site log/pass are, finger print you, etc.

      I guess its also lucky they asked questions first and did not just start shooting.

      Or perhaps they could throw you into a for profit prison and forced you to work, but its OK because they are prisoners not slaves.

      Maybe China needs to elect a sexual predator to their highest office

      From an outsiders perspective where we are not inundated and indoctrinated about how "great" the USA is, it actually looks just as sick as China, but just for different reasons.

    3. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by jediborg · · Score: 2

      Fundamental human rights are fundamental to all humans, just because some Governments don't respect citizens rights doesn't mean those citizens don't have rights, it just means their government is morally bankrupt. Read the declaration of Independence as written by Thomas Jefferson, it wasn't just a declaration of human rights for Americans, it was a declaration for all mankind.

      When governments become corrupt abusers, it is not just the right, nay the DUTY of the abused to rise up, overthrow the government, and institute a new form of government that will respect the rights of the people and derive their power from the consent of the governed.

      The Chinese government opened up the genie bottle when they let their citizens own property and earn wages from selling labor. Now that the citizens have had a taste of freedom they will inevitably demand more. It might take time and a few setbacks, but eventually there will be revolution. Its just the natural course of human events...

    4. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      America isn't really a "police" state as it is a "corporatist" state. In China (as in Russia) there is overlap between the people with the money and the people with the guns, but when push comes to shove the people with the guns always win. In the US, the people with the money essentially control the people with the guns (through the facade of the "rule of law"). Insofar as VPNs remain useful to the people with money, VPNs will remain available in the US. In China the people with the guns don't care about privacy so much because even when you do know what they're up to, there's nothing you can do about it, so they're prepared to close off that route to privacy.

    5. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is possibly the most ignorant and narrow-minded comment I've ever read on Slashdot.

      How so? I lived in China for several years, travel to China regularly on business, and am currently working in Shanghai. You do not have much protection against search and seizure here. The police have much more power to collect evidence and compel compliance.

      But that doesn't mean more oppression. A Chinese citizen is much less likely to actually be arrested and incarcerated. Americans are more than four times as likely to be locked up.

    6. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Someone in China has far more rights than someone in the US.

      It would be more accurate to say they have different rights.

      They have a fairer justice system

      They have a different justice system, with a different objective. American courts emphasize (at least in theory) individual rights. Chinese courts emphasize public order. China is mostly successful at that, and is a very safe country. Meanwhile, in America, the plea bargain system has eroded our right to a trial, trials are anything but "speedy", and the rich are far more likely to be acquitted.

      To see what is wrong with American justice, look at the trial of O.J. Simpson.

      To see what is wrong with Chinese justice, look at the trial of Bo Xilai.

    7. Re:Where do you think you are, the U.S.? by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 2

      You assume the people in prison in the US is something to be outraged about, likening it to people jailed in China for speaking up.

      While a good chunk may be drug users here, that is not the same as tracking down and imprisoning someone who challenges your iron fist on power. What a clown.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  2. There's more to it than that by cheesybagel · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The Chinese government's censors and snitches have been a lot more active than usual. It started when the current President Xi Jinping rose to power and started his crackdown on Party "corruption". Later with the rising tensions in North Korea they've clamped down on all dissent and this includes tightening the screws on the Great Chinese Firewall.

    1. Re:There's more to it than that by cheesybagel · · Score: 4, Interesting

      When it happens in these regimes it is quite usually a sign of Bad Things To Come like a major purge or something. Remember this is the country which had the Cultural Revolution. So far the purges have been limited to major party officials. But it makes you think why are they so focused on tightening the screws like that. It's like they expect a major conflict or something. Stalin's purges in the Soviet Union preceded WWII and the Cultural Revolution in China preceded the Sino-Vietnamese War.

  3. Probably just the usual cycle by Spy+Handler · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Every 5 years the Chinese Communist Party has a big meeting and various leadership positions get shuffled around. It just so happens that another one of these is about to happen in a few months.

      Xi Jinping came into power in 2012 and it's widely believed that he will renew his position. Regardless, Chinese government always cracks down on various channels of dissent just before these meetings, or some other big event (such as Beijing Olympics). It usually blows over afterwards and things go back to normal.

  4. If you make VPNs to bypass government censors by Solandri · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Wouldn't it have been prudent to do your development work on a server outside the country? And use a VPN (with a password committed only to memory) to connect to the server, and do your coding work via remote desktop, rather than do the development locally? I mean it's not like the binary needs to be compiled inside the country where it's going to be used.

  5. And they wonder why they can't... by wisebabo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    get any (foreign experts) to run their gigantic brand new telescope

    https://science.slashdot.org/s...

    I mean, you'd really have to pay me a significant premium (not saying you couldn't) to do my job (bioinformatics/genetic engineering) in a country where there is not even a pretense of privacy/access to uncensored news. Of course, (almost) everyone has a price for (almost) every job so I guess they can just keep raising the salary until someone bites, they've got the money. (I realize that there are very few people in the world who fit their qualifications but there are some and I'm sure some of them might be tempted).

    The U.S. has tremendously benefited from China developing this way. If it wasn't so draconian on its suppression of (human) rights in the preservation of order (and the enrichment of party members), a lot more ethnic Chinese might be tempted to go. I personally know some Chinese-Americans who are quite prominent in their scientific field (no I didn't go to M.I.T. "Made In Taiwan" but close by!) who have no interest at all in working in Mainland China despite being actively recruited by the government there (basically every time they go to a conference there, someone will approach them). When you look at the number of scientists of (probably) Chinese descent contributing to American and European science (just look at the surnames of the authors of articles on "sciencedaily.com") you'll realize how much of our scientific dominance is due to their work.

    Of course Trump may flip this around