<Research into WeChat censorship and Chinese online rumors>
The power of online rumors extends far beyond their contents. Even when they are not specifically aimed at rallying masses to a cause, the transmission of even the most dubious of claims is still indicative of another kind of collective movement: an attack on the pervasive censorship system, which has encouraged online users to develop an extreme form of skepticism wherein, as Hu Yong, a professor at Peking University’s School of Journalism and Communication, suggests, “news looks like rumor and rumor looks like news.” In such an environment, the spread of rumors on the Chinese Internet is not surprising—and considering their implicit criticism of the credibility of authorities, neither is the effort by government officials and social media companies to restrict them.
—”China’s Rumor Mill: Why Beijing Is Cracking Down on ‘Unverified’ Information Online,” Foreign Affairs
The above is from an article I wrote last month in Foreign Affairs based on my research into what kind of posts are censored on the public accounts platform of WeChat, a mobile app that is incredibly popular in China right now. Among my conclusions (you can read the full report, “Politics, Rumors, and Ambiguity: Tracking Censorship on WeChat’s Public Accounts Platform” on the Citizen Lab blog) are: