China may cease web censorship in Shanghai free trade zone
China may be about to ease its notoriously authoritarian censorship of the web after a report emerged suggesting that uncensored access should be permitted in a small area of Shanghai.
A new free trade zone in the commercial hub would permit access to sites blacklisted elsewhere; such as Facebook, Twitter and the New York Times.
Unnamed sources quoted by the South China Morning Post said: “In order to welcome foreign companies to invest and to let foreigners live and work happily in the free trade zone, we must think about how we can make them feel at home.
“If they cannot get on to Facebook or read the New York Times, they may naturally wonder how special the free trade zone is, compared to the rest of China.”
Both Facebook and Twitter have been inaccessible to Chinese users since 2009 but Iran recently appeared to lift its own ban on the social media duo, a move that hasn’t gone unnoticed in China.
Such a move wouldn’t be without precedent in China; which has previously allowed open access for the 2008 Olympic Games and permitted full internet freedom to 10,000 students on campus at the university of Macau in Zhuhai, Guangdong province.