WeChat

The Chinese government has been accessing deleted WeChat messages without a warrant, leading to easy crackdowns on dissidents.

The Chinese government has cracked down on the popular instant messaging service WhatsApp, blocking pictures, videos, and even some texts.

The Chinese government worked very hard to erase the existence of Nobel Prize-winning dissident Liu Xiaobo, making it a criminal offense merely to mention his name. Nevertheless, Chinese citizens are finding clever ways to dodge the Beijing Internet police, celebrating the life of the famed democracy activist and mourning his death in custody this week.

The order from China forbids live-blogging and live-streaming. The order does not affect social media and microblogging sites such as WeiBo and WeChat.

Gaining the worldwide rights to stream 10 NFL Thursday Night games is a positive for Twitter, but it does not address the erosion of its Monthly Average User (MAU) numbers, and competition from Facebook, YouTube and WeChat.

As 200 shareholders cheered Apple CEO Tim Cook’s battle with the FBI for a “backdoor” into the iPhone, but the real battle is Apple’s attempt to save its lucrative “walled garden.”

Kentucky Fried Chicken’s China division is striking back against rumors that it has genetically modified chickens to grow six wings and eight legs, filling a defamation suit against three Chinese companies as the Chinese government launches a campaign a to cleanse online “rumors, negativity and unruliness.”

China is cracking down on free speech again. This time, an internet watchdog and organ of the country’s Communist Party has banned web users from using pseudonyms to post messages under the names of famous people. A new set of rules will also require Internet users to register accounts using their real names.