The Internet in Asia

South Korean President participate in an online debate on poverty

South Korea has one of the highest broadband penetration rates in the world, and South Koreans viewed as the earliest adopters of ICT technology. Their president, Roh Moo-hyun is aware of this and is scheduled to hold an unprecedented live-on line debate on poverty with the public according to a statement issued by the presidential Blue House. He has just passed his three year mark of a single five-year presidency term and has promised to focus the remainder of his term on reducing social disparity and on reaching a free trade agreement with the United States.

Korea fights back against China's web attacks

The Korean government has decided to block the backdoor Internet pathway from abroad, to help reduce the problem of identity theft. One of the main problems they faced before blocking the Internet pathway is personal data leakage especially to China. Since implementing this measure, they have been able to block 2,600 illegal IPs, which were found to be the main routes for penetrating the Korean network. One of the main problems faced with identity theft was the stealing of resident registration numbers, from Koreans in order to subscribe to ``Lineage,'' the popular
on-line game. To prevent the recurrence of massive personal data leakage, the ministry also unveiled a package of measures including propagation of security
patches as well as firewalls.

China launches fresh crackdown on spam

China has joined the fight against spam - The Ministry of Information Industry of China announced that a new regulation on email servers specifically targeting junk mail and a center for receiving complaints on junk mail has been established. Among other things, the regulation specifies that advertising e-mails cannot be sent without the receivers permission, and that violators will be prosecuted. According to a survey by the China Internet Association, 60% of email received between August 2004 and April 2005 in China was classified as junk mail.

Chinese Government bans teenagers from Internet cafés

Teenagers in China are banned from frequenting Internet cafes as part of the governments campaign to curb their exposure to 'immoral and harmful content'. The ban which also includes discos and karaoke bars will take effect from March 1. Last year, the Chinese government attempted to restrict the amount of time teenagers spent playing games on-line to three hours, for the same reasons.

Google #1 in China

A survey of 1,200 Chinese net surfers showed they prefer Google above local rivals such as Baidu.com, Sohu.com's Sogou site, and Yahoo's Chinese site, which is run by its Chinese affiliate, Alibaba.com.

According to the survey, sixty-eight percent of the users calls Google a "high quality" search engine. Baidu and Alibaba/Yahoo (rebranded as Yahoo Search China last November) also got relatively high marks, with 61% ranking them as high quality search engines.

To read more about this survey, click here.

Festive text messages become new tradition

In an example of new technology blending with old traditions, sending seasonal text message greetings has become essential for many Chinese people.

Xie Yi, 25, sent more than 50 Happy New Year messages to his relatives and friends on the evening of December 31.

Now, he has turned his attention to finding suitable words for his Spring Festival salutations, even though it isn't until January 29.

"I have to find some really creative messages for Spring Festival, and then I will become a big star and my messages will be passed around my friends," he said.

Mobile phone users in Shanghai sent over 180 million mobile messages between December 31 and January 1.

In Beijing, people sent more than 150 million texts in the two days, generating about 15 million yuan (US$1.86 million).

Zhao Yi, a spokesman for the world's largest mobile operator China Mobile, said the growth of the number of mobile messages is usually much higher during Spring Festival than during New Year's Day or Christmas.

He added that the contribution of the seasonal messages to his company is not very significant, but for other telecoms operators it is.

During last year's Spring Festival, Chinese people sent 11 billion messages during the seven-day vacation.

In the first 11 months of this year, as many as 274 billion messages were sent, 40 per cent higher than the same period in 2004.

Yu Zhangkun, an analyst with Beijing-based consulting firm Byna, said sending messages has become a custom for Chinese during festivals.

"After three to four years of development, sending greeting messages has melted into the blood of the people," he said

Source: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2006-01/05/content_509492.htm

The Great Firewall of China

Imagine what it will be like if signing an online petition, sending information to foreign organisation or even disseminating information about a certain virus that is spreading in the coutry are termed as offences by your authorities. 

In China, there is an estimated 30,000-strong internet police force who is dedicated to monitoring websites and e-mails of their people. Keyword blocking technology is still being used to prevent access to offending sites.  Increasingly, though, the authorities are relying on individuals to censor themselves or risk harsh and well publicised penalties if they dare to challenge the establishment.

Source:
The Great Firewall of China
by Richard Taylor
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/4587622.stm

Microsoft censors Chinese blogger

Microsoft has admitted to removing the blog of an outspoken Chinese journalist from its MSN Spaces site, citing its policy of adhering to local laws. Questions still remain over why a site believed to be hosted in the United States has to comply with Chinese law.

The blog, written by Zhao Jing, also known as Michael Anti, was removed from MSN servers on December 31, according to investigative journalist and former CNN reporter Rebecca Mackinnon. She claimed that the blog was actively removed by MSN staff rather than being blocked by Chinese authorities.

Responding to Mackinnon's report, Microsoft's own in-house blogger, Robert Scoble, said he was 'depressed' by the news and offered Anti the opportunity to blog via his site. 'It's one thing to pull a list of words out of a blog using an algorithm. It's another thing to become an agent of a government and censor an entire blogger's work,'

Scoble wrote.

Scoble's comments referred to reports in June 2005, when Microsoft acknowledged censoring words such as 'freedom' and 'democracy' from its Chinese MSN portal. In an e-mail sent to ZDNet UK sister site Silicon.com, Microsoft said, 'We don't disclose the list, but we do have the ability to change and update the filter, as needed, to help ensure we abide by the laws, regulations and norms of China.

' Source: http://news.com.com/Microsoft+censors+Chinese+blogger/2100-1028_3-6017540.html?tag=cd.lede - CNET News.com

Virtual Police Guards All Shenzhen Websites

Virtual "policemen" have been positioned in the main page of all Shenzhen websites.  People may click on the  cartoon policemen's icon (http://66110.qzone.qq.com, http://777110.qzone.qq.com ) and ask questions about information safety. Real policemen will attend to all their questions immediately.

According to a senior official of the Shenzhen cyber police, the "policemen" are put up to remind all netizens that the Internet is being protected by the law.  Hence people should be mindful of their behaviour when they are online.

What do you think of this move by the Shenzhen Cyber police? Do you think people will actually make use of this service and become more mindful of his/her own behaviour while online?

China's Central Government Website Launched!

The China's central government website which opened on the 1st January 2006 has become one of the most popular government websites by taking up the 744th place among all websites in just 24 hours. The website which is available in both the Chinese and English languages provide information about the government affairs, online services for citizens, enterprises and foreigners, interactive communication between governments and citizens, and other applied functions.

According to Alexa, a professional web information service provider, the website now ranks No. 2 among major national government websites, which is just below that of the Canadian government. An online survey conducted by the website shows that 93 percent respondents were "very satisfied" or "satisfied" with the operation of the website.