Gremlins

I call them the gremlins—the unseen watchers who snoop on online communications in China.  According to expat folklore, there are thousands of them in China, but because they are very discreet, you cannot be sure which technical difficulties they are responsible for. My Chinese colleagues tell me information control is not that robust.  Sometimes I feel like I’m paranoid.

I made an early morning SKYPE call to my friend Dennis Cope (5:30 am in China; his 5:00 pm), I am now certain my computer malfunction was an invasion. Dennis is a retired engineer and knows a great deal about these technologies. He said a virus or hardware malfunction would not be corrected by a simple update.

Young people  circumvent information control.  One of the students told me there are VPN services—I don’t know what the initials stand for—but with their assistance, they can see anything on the web.  They can access Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, and Google. The government plays cat and mouse with these services but has not stopped them.