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Tony Lin

28 Oct, 8 tweets, 2 min read

A man in China was caught by police for using VPN to browse Wikipedia. While using VPN has been deemed illegal in China, this is a rare case for the gov to specifically disclose what the VPN is used for: reading wikipedia for research

This case is publicly listed on Zhejiang gov's website. Link here: zjzwfw.gov.cn/zjzw/punish/fr…

For a long time, using VPN to get around the Chinese firewall is a gray area. It's widely used by expats, intl students an intl companies. But recently there's a surge of cases of individuals who are punished for using VPN.

The legal ground to arrest, intimidate and penalize VPN users is based on a law "计算机信息网络国际联网管理暂行规定". (Administrative Measures for the Security Protection of Computer Information Networks Linked to the Internet)

Article 6. 计算机信息网络直接进行国际联网，必须使用邮电部国家公用电信网提供的国际出入口信道。任何单位和个人不得自行建立或者使用其他信道进行国际联网。(No entities or individual shall build channels to access international internet)

As mentioned, there's a surge of people who are arrested for VPN usage. It often happens in smaller, less developed regions. Again, expats, ppl in big cities often get away with it.

But can big city folks really get away with it? 2 months ago, Xi'an Procuratorate (the municipal agency responsible for both prosecution and investigation) published an article calling out illegal VPN usage. It caused havoc in China cuz many ppl still don't know VPN is illegal

No matter how comfortable you're with using VPN in China, it is a dangling sword hanging over everyone's head. I didn't feel like writing a thread at first. Now that I've done it, I'm just sad, first for the need to use VPN to begin with and then for it's not even allowed now

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