War against porn should be just and legal

• Source: Global Times
• [02:28 January 15 2010]
• Comments

By Chen Chenchen

Have you heard of a cellphone's short message service (SMS) being cut off for sending dirty jokes? It happened to Mr Zhang from Dongguan, Guangdong Province recently.

China Mobile Communication Corporation (CMCC) detected "dirty" words in his message to a friend and stripped his phone of SMS.

To get it restored, he was asked to promise – in writing to the local public security department – that henceforth he would not send any "unhealthy" message.

A CMCC telephone operator said that there was cooperation with public security department to control "illegal" messages. If CMCC's detection system or customer complaints find any message content that spreads pornography, terror or violence, SMS would be terminated.

As cellphone porn became widespread in 2009, the Ministry of Public Security launched a crackdown against originating websites since last November.

These porn sites, in collusion with some advertisers, bombarded cell-phone carriers through the telecom platform. Such websites, with their tremendous operational scale and reach, cannot be allowed to get away with the crime of disseminating obscene material. The porn transmitters deserve to be eliminated ruthlessly.

In contrast, an individual's P2P messages to a couple of friends can hardly be categorized as porn.

In Zhang's case, he neither "broadcast" obscene content nor caused social unrest. For many, sharing jokes – dirty or "clean" – is part of their friendship or a way of staying in touch. Depriving them of access to SMS for a dirty joke is actually a violation of their freedom of communication.

More frightening is that continuous interception of civilian SMS may evolve into disguised wiretap. CMCC, currently authorized to check obscenity in short messages, is technically able to monitor all the contents that cellphone users transmit everyday. A message intercepted by CMCC may also include sensitive personal information, which is serious violation of customer privacy.