Recently, Epoch Times obtained a document that the Chinese Communist Party’s local branch at the Public Opinion Center of Xinjiang Cyberspace Affairs Office (the Public Opinion Center) issued on June 20, 2019.
According to the document, the Public Opinion Center currently monitors and inspects Xinjiang-related information on the entire Internet at all times, by all means, and through all platforms, with an average of more than 1 million inspections per day.
From its establishment in 2014 to June 2019, the Public Opinion Center “reported and investigated” (i.e., referred for investigations and penalties) a total of more than 1.07 million pieces of information related to the “CCP, government, military, violence, terrorism, and religious extremism.” It shut down over 4,800 websites, canceled over 4,440 new media accounts, and suspended over 760 websites. It interrogated over 690 persons in charge of the websites and investigated over 63,000 netizens.
The document stated that the Public Opinion Center focuses on the Internet postings about the “China threat theory,” the “China penetration theory,” the “Chinese hegemony theory,” and “strictly investigates officials who violate discipline and the law and engage in internal fighting.” The Public Opinion Center monitored and censored over 150,000 pieces of political information, including 145,000 pieces of information outside Xinjiang and over 5,000 pieces of information inside Xinjiang. The CCP Central Government’s Cyberspace Affairs Office repeatedly commended the Public Opinion Center of the Xinjiang Cyberspace Affairs Office.
The Xinjiang Cyberspace Affairs Office keeps an eye on more than 2,300 Xinjiang-related key people and key accounts.
To control the dissemination of videos, over 500,000 videos have been censored, information transmission has been blocked more than 6.3 million times, and 40,281 information samples have been blocked and filtered.
For example, the document stated that in May 2017, the CCP Central Committee and the Xinjiang autonomous region worked together to “purify the public opinion environment.” The Public Opinion Center directed the cyber information offices of all prefectures and cities across Xinjiang to dispose of more than 200,000 pieces of negative information.
To join the Public Opinion Center, one must pass a strict “political” background check, and must also be in good health to be able to monitor online 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and 365 days a year. As for language skills, people working at the Public Opinion Center are proficient in Uighur, Kazakh, English, Russian, Uzbek, Arabic, and other languages.
Source: Epoch Times, August 30, 2020
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/20/8/26/n12358317.htm