Authorities implement a new measure to monitor the country’s blogosphere
Beijing-based microbloggers on Friday will be prevented from registering an account on one of the country’s hugely popular Twitter-like services in anything but their real name, verified by their national ID card.
The move has been slammed by netizens and rights groups alike as a huge blow to freedom of expression in China, where many rely on services like Sina Weibo to find news and views that have been censored out of the tightly controlled state media.
“The microblog revolution, sharing of opinions, and increased circulation of news resulting from microblogs have led the regime to take certain measures,” the Paris-based press freedom group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in an annual report this week. Read the rest of this entry »
