China blocks website of Australia’s national broadcaster ABC

[Matrix]

China has blocked access to the website of Australia’s national broadcaster for breaching Beijing’s internet rules and regulations, ABC said on Monday.

It comes a year after the Australian Broadcasting Corporation began running a Chinese-language service.

ABC said access to its website and apps was blocked on August 22 and it has since been trying to find out why.

 

After repeated requests for clarification, an official from China’s Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission dictated a statement to the broadcaster.

 

“We welcome internet enterprises from all over the world to provide good information to the netizens of China,” said the official, who declined to give his name, according to ABC.

“However, state cyber sovereignty rights shall be maintained towards some overseas websites violating China’s laws and regulations.”

The official said these included websites “spreading rumours, pornographic information, gambling, violent terrorism and some other illegal harmful information which will endanger state security and damage national pride”.

 

ABC said it had not been told what laws it had violated or which content sparked the ban.

However, ties between Canberra and Beijing have been strained recently over allegations that China is interfering in Australia’s domestic politics and using donations to gain access.

The claims infuriated China, which has dismissed local media stories — including by ABC — about infiltration as hysteria and paranoia.

The ABC also recently reported on Beijing’s push into the Pacific through “soft diplomacy”, which Australia and New Zealand fear could potentially upset the strategic balance in the region.  

 

 

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[steven36]

How did  they be watching it there in China anyway only way i can watch it  is use a vpn or and addon that uses a Aussie proxy to get around geo  block while its a free channel toAustralia  most of there channels are blocked  aboard .

From what i read here they  only ABC  removed part of there geo blocks back in June 2018 so  most of it is still blocked to watch in China  except for the news and a few other things. http://about.abc.net.au/press-releases/abc-australia-delivers-for-international-viewers/

 

I just  tested  it only way i can watch ABC  from there website is use  a vpn  with AU iphttps://iview.abc.net.au/show/abc-live-stream/video/IV1512H001S00

 

What was blocked were there website you cant watch the main ABC without vpn or proxy noway

 

China blocks access to Australian Broadcasting Corp sites

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-45392570

 

You dont need a vpn to access there sites but you need a vpn  to play most stuff on them . In a world of Geo blocks , no broadcasting company is better than China on this matter  because they been blocking everyone but there own country all along . The AU ,NZ or UK dont want me watching there pubic channels i cant just download a legal app and watch it and the USA dont want them watching ours ether you have to buy illegal iptv , use a vpn or some free Android  apk , windows app or kodi addon to get around it. We live in a world of total hypocrisy. Pointing 1 finger at someone and 4 back at themselves  and the AU government   have never gave there  viewers very good options for years they had to wait tell most programs from aboard came out on DVD a year latter to even watch them. Now they try to block piracy so Amazon and Apple Itunes can make a killing.    

 

 

[mclaren85]

China should compete with U.S. not Aussies.

[steven36]

48 minutes ago, mclaren85 said:

China should compete with U.S. not Aussies.

The Aussies blocked Chinese from being able to sell 5 G internet in Australia. Australia and the USA have always been close allies . This was most likely pay back for that , but this shows you  dont know  nothing about China.  All there media  has been censored.  say if i download a R6 with Chinese subtitles of a movie from the USA all the parts they don't want there people to see have been cut out. So they don't allow foreign media without them censoring it 1st.

 

Quote

 

The ABC launched a Chinese-language version of its news site last year.

ABC previously criticised

The latest move comes amid a period of diplomatic tensions between the two nations over reports of China's alleged interference in Australian politics and society. This had led to Canberra enacting new laws aimed at preventing foreign interference.

Last year, China's embassy in Canberra heavily criticised Australia media reports, including an investigation from the ABC and Fairfax Media, about Beijing's influence in Australia.

"Those reports, which were made up out of thin air and filled with Cold War mentality and ideological bias, reflected a typical anti-China hysteria and paranoi[a]," the embassy said.

 

Quote

 

Film censorship in China involves the banning of local and international films deemed unsuitable for release or the editing of such films to remove objected content by the governments in both Republic of China (ROC) and People's Republic of China (PRC). The long history in ROC's film censorship is a prelude to that of the PRC, but the exhaustive list of films on this page is going to focus on PRC which is still a one-party state and took over the ROC in controlling mainland China after the Chinese Civil War. ROC has attempted age-based rating system as early as November 1948, become a democracy since the 1980s, and technically dropped censorship requirement in its film law in 2015, despite it still may not issue the Restricted rating occasionally, if the film elicits feelings of shame or disgust in persons over the age of 18. In Mainland China, films are currently reviewed by the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT) (Chinese: 国家新闻出版广电总局) which dictates whether, when, and how a movie gets released.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_censorship_in_China

 

Its a wonder  that they let ABC get away  with posting western influenced  news as long as they did, but now the Aussie news are saying China are national security threat to  Australia .

[steven36]

What a coincidence: ABC news website blocked in China

 

Beijing: In China, coincidences are common. Clear explanations of what has just happened can be harder to find.

 

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation's website has been inaccessible in China for a fortnight. Although China has famously erected a "Great Firewall" around its online population to block internet users from accessing many western websites and social media apps including Google, Twitter and Facebook, it is unusual for an Australian media website to be blocked.

 

But the day after the Turnbull government quietly announced rules that would exclude one of China's biggest private companies, Huawei, from involvement in Australia's 5G network rollout, the ABC website became inaccessible.

 

The Chinese government was angry over the Huawei decision, and its commerce ministry labelled the Australian ban on technology companies that were seen to take direction from a foreign government (not explicitly named as Chinese companies) the "wrong decision".

 

Australians in China looked at the timing and began to wonder: "Coincidence?"

 

The ABC reported on Monday that it had received a response from the Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission that appears to confirm the news website had been censored.

 

"State cyber sovereignty rights shall be maintained towards some overseas websites violating China's laws and regulations, spreading rumours, pornographic information, gambling, violent terrorism and some other illegal harmful information which will endanger state security and damage national pride," an official from the cyber security regulator told the ABC.

 

The ABC reported that it had not been informed how it was alleged to have violated any Chinese law.

 

There are more coincidences.

 

The ABC began translating news items into Chinese on its website a year ago.

 

It is also known that the Chinese government has been unhappy with Australian media reporting about China, particularly a Four Corners episode on Chinese influence screened on the ABC, for at least a year.

 

The Four Corners episode was part of a joint investigation with Fairfax Media reporters.

 

The issue of Australian media coverage of China was frequently raised by Chinese diplomats in talks with Australian counterparts, and at a high-level dialogue between Australia and China attended by former Prime Minister John Howard, last year.

 

The response from Australian officials was that, although the ABC is government-owned, it is an independent broadcaster.

 

In China, where stated-owned media all sing from the government song sheet, this has been hard for them to digest.

 

Former foreign minister Julie Bishop, in an attempt to repair ties with Beijing after a diplomatic freeze, met informally with Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi in May at a G20 event in Buenos Aires.

 

China's foreign ministry said Bishop had told Wang this: "Due to some negative reports of Australia's domestic media, the relations between Australia and China have been affected. She would like to clarify here that these reports are quite inaccurate and do not represent the position of the Australian government at all."

 

Bishop later disputed this account, but the Chinese statement clearly showed where Beijing was laying blame.

 

Of course, the diplomatic freeze Bishop was attempting to lift, so that she could make her first visit to Australia's biggest trading partner in two years, was never officially confirmed.

 

Was it just a coincidence that no Australian minister had stepped foot on Chinese soil in the five months after former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull spoke about the Australian people standing up - in mangled Mandarin - to spruik his new foreign interference laws?

 

Like the coincidence of Chinese customs delaying crates of Australian wine at the docks for weeks over paperwork when Beijing was unhappy at Australian politicians commenting on China's ambitions in the Pacific?

 

Another coincidence - the no-show of a planned Australia Week trade fair in Shanghai this year.

 

Amid allthe coincidences, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has recited one of Beijing's oldest, favourite lines: "China's a sovereign country, they make decisions about what happens there, we make decisions about what happens here," he told radio station 3AW on Monday morning, when asked about the ABC website.

 

DFAT said it had "raised this issue with Chinese authorities, and will continue to do so".

 

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