Explainer: Websites blocked in Hong Kong – when, how, and why the list is growing
Hong Kong Free Press
A key feature of Hong Kong’s business environment that differentiates it from mainland China is its free and open internet. However, the city is not immune to internet controls, with a growing list of websites apparently blocked by telecoms firms and Internet Service Providers (ISPs), with some citing police demands.
Although it is also not clear how many websites have been made inaccessible over the years, a media platform appeared last week to have been partially blocked, marking a first in Hong Kong. Previously, political websites, Taiwanese organisations, the US military, or doxxing platforms had been targeted.
Whilst, in some cases, there was confirmation that the blocks were at the request of the local authorities, law enforcement officials have not been transparent about if, when, and how website blocks are requested or enacted.
In other cases, websites have been made inaccessible by webmasters themselves – such as in the case of TikTok, which closed in Hong Kong days after the 2020 security law was enacted.
Under what law can a website be blocked?
There are several key pieces of legislation that have been used, or can be, to demand the removal of internet content or punish those who share content online.
In June 2020, Beijing inserted national security legislation directly into Hong Kong’s mini-constitution following a year of pro-democracy protests and unrest. The move gave police sweeping new powers and led to hundreds of arrests amid new legal precedents, while dozens of civil society groups disappeared. Article 43 of the security law provides the police with powers to order a person or service provider to delete or assist in the removal of information published online in the interests of protecting national security.
In response, most western tech firms suspended their compliance with data requests under the security law. Tech giants Google, Facebook and WhatsApp, Twitter – now X – Telegram, Zoom, and Microsoft’s LinkedIn were among those which halted data requests. Nevertheless, Article 38 of the legislation says that the law applies globally.
This year, Hong Kong was finally able to legally restrict the distribution of the 2019 protest movement’s adopted anthem Glory to Hong Kong – a move that its composer foresaw back in 2020. Google removed multiple instances of the song from YouTube following a court injunction.
In 2022, a new clause in Hong Kong’s Unified Carrier Licence guidelines gave authorities broad powers to order phone networks, internet service providers and other telecommunications companies to block websites, calls and messages.
Nikkei reported that new language on “blocking transmission or delivery of calls or messages and suspension of service due to fraudulent use” requires that licensees must carry out “necessary actions” requested by “any relevant law enforcement agency.”
Other notable laws include Section 161 of the Crimes Ordinance, which refers to “access to a computer with criminal or dishonest intent.” It has been used to prosecute a range of computer and smartphone-related offences.
Enacted in 1993, before internet use became widespread, those convicted under the law face up to five years in prison. In 2019, the Department of Justice was criticised by the apex court for using the legislation as a “catch-all” mechanism for prosecuting computer-related crimes.
Whilst other sections of the Crimes Ordinance, Copyright Ordinance, Control of Obscene and Indecent Articles Ordinance and Telecommunications Ordinance have also been used to deal with computer-related offences, evidence points to the 2020 security law being used to demand that political content is blocked.
The police did not respond to questions about whether, how and when they have requested website blocks, but a spokesperson said on Thursday: “Police will take appropriate actions where necessary according to actual circumstances and in accordance with the law.”
How are websites blocked?
Research by the Internet Monitoring Action Project last year suggested blocks have mostly been achieved with DNS (Domain Name System) tampering. When a web browser requests to access a website and connect to an Internet Protocol (IP) address, the web address can be intercepted and checked against a predefined blocklist by the service provider. The user can then be blocked from arriving at the website, according to SafeDNS.
Compared to China’s “Great Firewall,” the censorship method is rudimentary and there is no public list of websites that the authorities deem problematic.
In a blog post, developer Nathan Hammond said that, if the police were making ad hoc takedown requests to ISPs, the rate at which websites can be blocked remains limited.
“It implies that there is no regular process for making these types of requests. Each request will necessarily have a non-trivial amount of communication overhead, dramatically limiting the rate at which web properties can be blocked. A more-worrying – and faster – approach would be a ‘push’ to the ISPs, where the government uses a form to make a request to the ISP to implement a change,” he wrote in 2021.
Hammond described the technical approach as “internet censorship amateur hour,” given how easily blocks can be overcome with tools such as online circumvention tools like virtual private networks (VPNs). But he warned that internet users should expect the authorities “to increase their power and competency.”
Which websites are blocked in Hong Kong?
It is not known how many websites have been affected by internet blocks in Hong Kong, but several have hit the headlines in recent years.
Anti-gov’t website HKChronicles
In January 2021, local media reported that police had ordered the city’s major telecoms providers to block access to HKChronicles. Hong Kong Broadband Network later confirmed to HKFP that it has blocked the anti-government website in order to comply with the national security law.
HKChronicles had gathered information during the 2019 protests and operated as a pro-democracy doxxing platform, revealing the personal information of police officers and pro-Beijing supporters.
“We have disabled the access to the website in compliance with the requirement issued under the National Security Law,” an HKBN spokesperson told HKFP at the time, though other internet providers did not respond to enquiries.
Whilst HKChronicles was blocked and anti-doxxing laws toughened, a website detailing the personal date of pro-democracy activists’ and journalists – HK Leaks – remained online for years despite repeated complaints to the authorities.
Exiled activist Glacier Wong voiced concerns that the move against HKChronicles exemplified the decline of the free flow of online information. “An open Internet has always been the cornerstone of freedom in a place. Disrupting Internet freedom also undermines the flow of information, freedom of communication, and freedom of the press,” she tweeted at the time.
Taiwan’s Transitional Justice Commission (now dissolved)
Active between 2018 and 2022, the independent Transitional Justice Commission was a Taiwanese agency tasked with investigating the actions of the Kuomintang party between 1945 and 1992. It sought to redress judicial injustice, remove authoritarian symbols and improve access to political archives.
In February 2021, its website became inaccessible in Hong Kong, according to the now-closed Apple Daily and Stand News.
2021 Hong Kong Charter (now closed)
Eight Hong Kong pro-democracy activists in self-imposed exile overseas launched a charter in 2021 calling for democracy and autonomy in the city, as well as solidarity among Hongkongers overseas.
One the founders of the 2021 Hong Kong Charter, the now-wanted activist Nathan Law, said at the time: “[Our] aim is to try to build up our pathway back home, and also consolidate the effort of international advocacy work and lay out our beliefs to the international community clearly with the ‘2021 HK charter’ movement.”
Months later, Hong Kong police requested that Israeli web host Wix remove the website, warning that the content broke the national security law and that staff could face fines or prison. The letter to Wix – shared by Law – was the first confirmation that the authorities were demanding takedowns under the controversial security law.
Wix initially complied but backtracked after Law went public. “The website was removed by mistake,” a spokesperson told AFP. “We are also reviewing our screening process in order to improve and make sure that mistakes such as this do not repeat in the future.”
The website was subsequently blocked in Hong Kong, with HK01 reporting that ISPs had been ordered by police to prevent access.
Hong Kong Watch
In February 2022, the website for UK NGO Hong Kong Watch became largely inaccessible in Hong Kong. Founder Benedict Rogers said in response: “With the steady drip of website removals, there are fears that China could begin introducing its Great Internet Firewall into the city. With time this could have serious ramifications for the continued presence of western technology companies in the city.”
Social media pages for Hong Kong Watch remained accessible, with the police refusing to comment on individual cases.
A month after the block, HKFP reported that Hong Kong’s Security Bureau had threatened Rogers with life in prison and fines for allegedly breaching the city’s national security law. Local authorities accused the group of interference and said the law applies worldwide.
“Criminal investigation reveals that ‘Hong Kong Watch’ has been engaging in activities seriously interfering in the affairs of the HKSAR and jeopardising national security of the People’s Republic of China,” the letter read.
Online June 4th Museum
The online June 4th Museum, preserving the memory of Beijing’s bloody crackdown on protesters in 1989, became inaccessible via several of Hong Kong’s major telecom providers in September 2021. It came less than two months after the site was first launched and three weeks after police confiscated exhibits at a separate, real-life museum in Hong Kong.
The site displayed a virtual archive of key events and figures of the student-led demonstrations in mainland China that ended in a crackdown by the People Liberation Army, leaving hundreds, perhaps thousands, of civilians dead.
The group behind it, the now-disbanded Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, said the website was administered by an independent team as a precaution, citing “intensified political pressure.”
The online museum had remained live after police ordered the Alliance to remove its digital presence in mid-September.
Hong Kong Democracy Council
The website for Hong Kong Democracy Council appeared to have been partially blocked in October 2022, a move which the US-based NGO said “unironically” lent support to a report it had published hours earlier about the need for international businesses to think carefully about operating in Hong Kong.
A police spokesperson declined to comment when approached by HKFP, but highlighted Article 43 of the national security law.
Additionally, the police highlighted Article 3 of the security legislation, which stipulates that Hong Kong authorities “shall effectively prevent and suppress any act or activity endangering national security in accordance with the law,” saying it was applicable to “electronic message(s) on an electronic platform” that were likely to cause or constitute an offence. “The public can continue to use the internet lawfully and will not be affected,” the spokesperson added.
The HKDC website is home to a number of reports and databases, including public lists of alleged political prisoners in the city and businesses believed to have violated United Nations human rights principles in Hong Kong.
Samuel Bickett’s blog
In September 2023, the website for the Substack blog hosted by rights activist Samuel Bickett became inaccessible in Hong Kong. He tweeted in response: “I’m honestly honored that my words angered someone in the authoritarian gov’t so much that they censored me, and proud to join other censored advocates like [HKDC]”
Bickett’s blog and newsletter seek to monitor “Hong Kong’s deteriorating human rights and rule of law.” The American lawyer was deported from Hong Kong in 2022 after serving time in prison for assaulting a police officer in 2019. He has maintained his innocence and said the prosecution was politically motivated.
Flow HK
Automattic – the company behind web content management system WordPress – told HKFP in October that it had received a take-down demand from the Hong Kong police relating to Flow HK, a media outlet co-founded by pro-democracy activists who have left the city. The company said it had not complied with the order and had notified the site owner.
Co-founder Sunny Cheung said police claimed the outlet was suspected of violating the security law imposed by Beijing in 2020 and a separate security law enacted in March, the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, known locally as Article 23.
Police told HKFP they “will take appropriate actions where necessary according to actual circumstances and in accordance with the law.”
Cheung, who remains wanted by the police on unrelated charges, called the authorities’ move “highly unreasonable” and said the publication “will not be intimidated.”
US military, and other websites
Last year, the Internet Monitoring Action Project tested 3,397 websites in Hong Kong over the course of a year using an Open Observatory Network Interference detection and reporting system. Their study involved over 2.3 million measures and concluded that several other websites had been blocked by ISPs, including over a dozen relating to the US military, such as navy.com.
Tests by HKFP have suggested that not all ISPs block all websites that are apparently in the crosshairs – some problematic websites have still been available via university campus and commercial internet providers.
Meanwhile, some websites have apparently become accessible again after previously being blocked. The website of the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan was blocked in 2019, according to the Taipei Times. It appeared to be inaccessible as it was raising funds to help Hongkongers flee arrest during the protests and unrest, but was later unblocked.
HKFP contacted five telecoms firms about internet censorship but did not receive any response.
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