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China Internet Surveillance Slows Access

Posted on: Thursday, 6 March 2003, 06:00 CST

China Internet Surveillance Slows Access

source: Associated Press Tech News

BEIJING - China's Internet users are suffering sharp slowdowns in access because of the communist government's heightened efforts to police online content, industry experts say.

Some experts say problems have worsened this week, suggesting Beijing is tightening surveillance during the annual meeting of China's parliament.

China is trying to reap the Internet's benefits while also controlling what its people read and hear. Authorities have invested both in spreading Internet access and in installing technology to scan Web sites and e-mail for content deemed subversive or obscene.

Beijing has essentially built an online barrier around China, requiring traffic in and out to pass through just eight gateways — a step that heightens official control. Banned topics include human rights and the outlawed Falun Gong (news - web sites) spiritual group.

Problems emerged in October after the installation of "packet-sniffer" software that briefly holds chunks of data for screening.

Each item emerging from China bears the same Internet return address, showing that all are held up at the same location rather than coming directly from their senders, said Michael Iannini, general manager of Nicholas International Consulting Services Inc. in Beijing.

Iannini compares it to all of China's Web surfers — a population that the government says hit 59 million in January — breathing through the same tiny air hole.

"Through this hole the government has set up many filters," he said.

The snarl is worsened by the breakup of China's former monopoly phone company amid double-digit growth in its online population, already the world's second-largest.

China Telecom was split to spur competition and encourage better, cheaper service. But it has left China's north in the hands of a spinoff company with sharply lower Internet capacity.

Ordinary users say their biggest problems occur when reaching foreign Web sites and particularly on weekdays, when many people log on simultaneously from work. They say access sometimes is so slow that they can't reach Google, Hotmail and other popular foreign sites — many based in the United States.

"At home sometimes it's too slow to use, and at work, it's even slower," said Sara Li, a former magazine editor in Beijing.

Access is even slower, she said, during "special time periods" — a reference to such politically sensitive events as the National People's Congress under way in Beijing.

Help could come from the spread of faster "broadband" access, which has reached some 4 million users, said Todd Bryan of MFC Insight, a Beijing consulting firm. But he said the lack of a standard national network means many aren't getting the best service.

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