As Beijing tightens grip on VPNs, internet users in China adapt

Internet users in China are finding it harder to use VPNs to get around China's "Great Firewall" as authorities crack down. (ABC News: Jarrod Fankhauser) Link copiedShareShare articleLin recently returned to China after getting her master's degree in Australia and is again using virtual private networks (VPNs) to climb over the "Great Firewall", Beijing's censorship apparatus. She first used a VPN as a high school student to "stay on top of celebrity news and events" on Instagram. When Lin returned home last year, she found that the VPN she relied on a decade ago was still up and running, but unstable. "It's hard to articulate how often the disturbance occurs," said Lin, who asked to use a pseudonym for safety reasons. "Sometimes, videos on Instagram load really slow." VPNs are becoming more difficult to access in China. (Reuters: Florence Lo ) Lin said the VPN app she used was able to route her connection through different countries. Whenever one route was not working, she switched to a different one to restart the app. "They have routes like Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore. I don't know exactly what they mean. I just switch when it's not working," she said. An estimated one million people took part in the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. (AFP: Catherine Henriette) Billy, a Hong Kong resident who also asked to use a pseudonym, regularly travels to mainland China and for two years used a VPN called LetsVPN. Billy told the ABC that he found LetsVPN, which is popular with expats in China, after a few other VPNs did not work. In April, LetsVPN issued a statement saying it "made a difficult decision" to "suspend services in China's mainland area" due to "the impact of continuous internet blockage". In May, the company resumed "standard operations" but said it could not guarantee service availability in China. Billy said he had decided to switch VPNs to a new one that still worked. "It's becoming more difficult finding stable VPNs," he said. "China recently is very active on banning VPN services." Hundreds of pages of secret documents leaked to the ABC provide a rare glimpse into how human censors and AI erase references to Beijing's violent crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in 1989. US-based censorship analyst Eric Liu said there was a new round of crackdowns on VPNs in April. Mr Liu said telecom carriers in parts of China were asked to comb through their networks and block all VPN services. At the same time, some netizens in China posted on social media that the VPN services they used were down. Mr Liu said that often when people experienced difficulties using VPN services it was because the government had just installed new censorship technology. He said it could also happen during sensitive political events, like national congress weeks in March or occasions like the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. On June 4, 1989, pro-democracy protesters at Tiananmen Square, the centre of Beijing, faced a bloody crackdown from the Chinese army. The estimated death toll ranged from hundreds to thousands of people. Student protesters arriving at Tiananmen Square to join other pro-democracy demonstrators in May 1989. (Reuters: Shunsuke Akatsuka/File) The massacre remains a taboo and references are censored on the internet in China. The Great Firewall was established two decades ago, when China began systematic efforts to install technologies and implement regulations to keep the country's domestic internet space free from websites and services that the government deemed inappropriate. Ihsan Yilmaz, a professor from Deakin University who has studied censorship, said China had moved from blocking access to foreign websites to shutting down the methods people used to get around the Great Firewall. Professor Yilmaz said this included restricting unauthorised VPN services, disrupting VPN connections, removing VPN apps from app stores, and penalising some providers and users. LetsVPN and the Chinese government have been contacted for comment. Lin says whenever one VPN route is not working, she switches to a different route. (ABC News: Jarrod Fankhauser) For some people in China VPNs could be a "lifeline", said Professor Yilmaz. "For people living in authoritarian regimes, VPNs are often much more than a privacy tool," he said. "They allow people to access independent news, communicate with family or colleagues abroad, use blocked platforms, document abuses, and participate in political or civic life online. "For journalists, activists, minorities, students, researchers, and ordinary citizens, VPNs may provide one of the few remaining ways to reach the open internet." Research from the Global Public Policy Institute published this week indicated that years of government crackdowns had made unsanctioned VPNs less readily accessible to average internet users. State-approved VPNs, which are relatively easy for authorities to surveil, are still permitted. Ihsan Yilmaz is deputy direc

As Beijing tightens grip on VPNs, internet users in China adapt

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