The Golden Shield Project, colloquially known as the “Great Firewall of China”, is the Chinese government’s Internet surveillance and censorship campaign. OpenNet Initiative, a professional collaboration between the Cambridge Security Program, University of Toronto Citizen Lab, and Harvard Law School, declared the Firewall to be the most sophisticated content-filtering intranet regime in the world (Punyakumpol). The Ministry of Public Security, China’s principle security authority, initiated, developed, and operates the intranet project, policing both online and by human force. However, the issue is more complex, because “the Chinese economy benefits tremendously from the Internet, but the Internet, in turn, is interfering with its political stability” (Punyakumpol). The political motivations behind this severe censorship are a driving factor of the project’s resilience, and therefore has become one of the most controversial human rights topics in recent years.
The Great Firewall of China censors innumerable amounts of content for an assortment of reasons. The most common objective is to silence criticism of the Chinese government and to prevent ideologies contrary to Chinese Communist Party (CCP) policies from gaining momentum. The Chinese government goes beyond just blocking individual websites however, using “techniques to scan URLs and web page content for blacklisted keywords like ‘Tiananmen’ and block such traffic” (Hoffman). Due to this, they most often target social media platforms, virtual commercial exchange markets, and information-based registers. To compensate they have developed their own social networking sites, search engines, and directories, completely controlled by the Chinese government, allowing them the abi...
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My first reason why it was not worth the costs is the wall actually did not keep people out. It was not very protective. The wall affected so many things. It affected life styles, people's daily routine. It also affected families. (Doc. E). The wall was not one big long wall. It stretched three hundred miles to the west and there was a watchtower beyond the wall end. But there were still places that were not protected by the wall. The Xiongnu could just walk around the wall and them come in and invade. People may think that they are fine because the wall is protecting them but they need to be aware that there are spots that are not protected by the wall. They would spend so much money on this wall to protect people when it really does not protect them that well (Doc. D). One of the most important reasons is that they had to pay the Xiongnu to stay out and not invade them. They paid them with Silk Thread and Silk Fabric. The amount they gave them from the year 51 BCE to one BCE they almost tripled the amount! It increased a lot. If they had to pay them to stay out them that proves that the Great Wall does not work.
Since its creation, the Internet has continuously grown in importance as a means to obtain information. This is due in part because it is not censored like the rest of America’s mainstream media, such as television, newspapers, and the radio. Nevertheless, the issue of censorship has raised many controversial issues, not only in the United States, but also throughout the world. In the debate by Intelligence2 (2008): Google Violates its Don’t be Evil Motto, it is argued that Google has violated its self declared motto that it wouldn’t be evil, thus putting people’s interest before their own corporate financial interests. While Google has committed certain questionable acts I do not believe they have violated their motto. Harry Lewis, Randal Picker, and Siva Vaidhyanathan argue that this violation is exposed in Goggle’s agreement to cooperate with the Chinese government in exchange of a larger monetary market and in its advertisement market (Intelligence2, 2008). Nevertheless, Esther Dyson, Jim Harper, and Jeff Jarvis argue that while such actions have occurred, the good it has brought to the over all population exemplifies their don’t be evil motto.
In 2006, Google created google.cn, this new browser offered competition to its competitors in that, there was a possibility of information privacy, hence information could not leak outside China. The users were informed of the screening process, and the Chinese-language was incorporated in google.com (Martin n.d). The censoring was due to the various results obtained as a result of various searches. The search results obtained received negative reactions from various scholars, non-governmental organizations and the citizens in general.
Internet is a powerful tool that allows users to collaborate and interact with others all over the world conveniently and relatively safely. It has allowed education and trade to be accessed easily and quickly, but all these benefits do not come without very taxing costs. This is especially true when dealing with the likes of the Internet. Countries in the European Union and Asia have realized this and have taken action against the threat of net neutrality to protect their citizens, even at the cost of online privacy. Internet censorship is required to protect us from our opinions and vices. Every country should adopt Internet censorship and regulation since it improves society by reducing pornography, racism/prejudice, and online identity theft.
Typically, controlling ideological unification, regulating flow of information, and neutralizing critical opinion are the focal points of government controlled censorship. For centuries, the Chinese people have been isolated from the rest of the world due to the People’s Republic of China, or PRC, government’s strict censorship laws. Though the rise of the Internet has increased the flow of information within China, all information is heavily scrutinized by the current censorship machine known as the Golden Shield Project, colloquially referred to as the Great Fi...
The Great Wall of China has been called a wonder by many who have seen it. It brings pride to the Chinese nation, and is known for being the only man made structure visible from space. The magnitude of The Great Wall is an architectural achievement as well as an example of the will power of man. Many find it hard to believe that such an amazing sight could have a history so filled with death, slavery and sadness as The Great Wall does. The Great Wall of China is one of the world's most famous architectural triumphs and has helped China throughout its history, even though its creation is marked by tragedy.
The government in china is very concerned with limiting the freedom of expression for it's citizens in all possible ways. Let's examine first the reason why censorship is such an important aspect for the Chinese government. According to the book “A Short History of China” by Gordon Kerr when the renaissance took place in Europe from the 14th through the 17th century it changed people's view in many different ways because it was “a period of exploration, discovery and advancement in almost every field”(Gordon Kerr 87); it was a rebirth of the ancient traditions. Mean...
Gorman, Siobhan. "China Singled Out for Cyberspying." The Wall Street Journal 4 Nov. 2011. Print. (Source E)
Thornton, P., (ed.) (2010), ‘Censorship and Surveillance in Chinese Cyberspace: Beyond the Great Firewall’ In Gries, P. H., and Rosen, S., (eds) Chinese Politics (London and New York: Routledge).
Nowadays, most people have Facebook, Twitter and YouTube account to share personal opinion with others on the Internet. However no one can control other’s mind and what they want to say, so there is some “reactionary speeches” are already being posted on the Internet. In order to control the online “reactionary speech” spread, Chinese government decided to forbid foreign Social networking, and crate Chinese Social networking like Renren, Youku, and Weibo to take the place of Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter for Chinese people, because Chinese Social networking is easier to control by Chinese government to keep away “reactionary speech”. Chinese government wants to protect Chinese social stability for Chinese people, the government not allow “reactionary speech” to disturb what Chinese people’s mind. Whereas, closing foreign social networking to Chinese people won’t be a good method for the development of Chinese society. If people of a country only know one-sided information and they cannot really know their country, how can they help their country to get great development? To know the comprehensive information of Chinese society won’t bring bad influence to Chinese people, but the one-sided understanding would be disadvantageous to the development of the country. China should accept foreign Social networking like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, because will allow Chinese people to gain comprehensive information about their world.
Censorship allows governments more control of society than they already have, slowly progressing governments utilizing censorship to a dictatorship. Often times, this censorship can lead to immense rebellions. A good example of this is in China, where Google has been censored by a provider called The Great Firewall of China, which censors information that could be viewed as defamatory or insulting to Chinese government and culture. According to the article “Google turns off China censorship warning” as published by BBC News Technology, “Google has had a rocky relationship with the Chinese authorities since January 2010, when the company said it may shut down Chinese operations due to a ‘sophisticated and targeted’ cyber attack. Google said at the time that it was no longer willing to censor the Google search engine”. Many journalists have also taken a look at Egypt, which also utilizes censorship. According to “Egyptian authorities step up censorship” as published by the Committee to Protect Journalists website, the new military-run Egyptian government is censoring news outlets and keep journalists, as well as the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates. “Egyptia...
Google is the largest search engine across the globe, which has significantly transformed the use of the Internet as an information source. The influence of Google in Internet use as information source is evident in the fact that by June 2010, it accounted for more than 70 percent of total Internet searches in America. In addition to its success and profitability in the global market, Google is renowned as a highly ethical company as demonstrated in its corporate philosophy features. However, the firm’s behavior during the launch of its China-based search engine in 2006 generated huge skepticism from the United States government and several human rights organizations (Baker & Tang, p.2). Since the launch of Google’s Chinese search engine, the company complied with China’s censorship regulations by deciding to filter out terms that are considered politically sensitive. This decision attracted criticism from political leaders and human rights activists who accused Google of betraying its adopted ethical standards by ignoring the essence of freedom of expression and information access. As a result, Google faced a dilemma involving the clash between law and ethics. In the subsequent years, Google reacted to the dilemma by changing its rhetoric strategies in efforts to respond to the changing needs.
With the end of the Cold War emerged two superpowers: The United States and the Soviet Union. The international system then was considered bipolar, a system where power is distributed in which two states have the majority of military, economic, and cultural influence both internationally and regionally. In this case, spheres of influence developed, meaning Western and democratic states fell under the influence of U.S. while most communist states were under the influence of the Soviet Union. Today, the international system is no longer bipolar, since only one superpower can exist, and indisputably that nation is the United States. However China is encroaching on this title with their rapid growth educationally, economically, and militaristically.
Zittrain, Jonathan, and Benjamin Edelman. Internet Filtering in China. Publication. N.p.: IEEE, 2003. Internet Filtering in China. Harvard.edu, Mar.-Apr. 2003. Web. 1 Dec. 2013.
Some western countries and China right molecules, they are kept denounce China's Internet censorship system, think the censorship restrictions on freedom of expression. However, this is no total freedom in the world, any kind of freedom is based on the legal. For example, in 1789, the French "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen" admit every citizen have the freedom of publish and speech, but after it there has other stipulation that government should bear the responsibility for the abuse of the freedom (Cai, 2010). Therefore, the censorship of Chinese government is also based on the existing law.