China paid trolls to control Covid-19 discourse online, suppress inconvenient news: Report

Chinese authorities reportedly paid trolls to manipulate social media discourse on Covid-19, confidential directives made to local propaganda workers and new outlets revealed on Sunday. According to a report published by New York Times and ProPublica, Chinese officials worked extensively to suppress ''inconvenient news'' concerning the novel Coronavirus.

China directed paid trolls to flood social media with party-line talks and deployed security forces to censor unsanctioned voices. The report states that Chinese officials had ordered not to notify the readers regarding the death of Dr Li Wenliang, who had initially warned about the outbreak, but the Chinese government did not pay heed to it, resulting in the unchecked spread of the deadly virus across the world.

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When Wenliang died of Covid-19, the officials instructed social platforms to gradually remove the doctor's name form trending topic pages and activated a host of fake online commenters to flood social sites with distracting content.

A special directive sent by the Chinese officials to news websites and social media platforms said: "... do not use push notifications, do not post comments, do not stir up the speculation. Safely control the fervour in online discussions, do not create hashtags, gradually remove from trending topics, strictly control harmful information."

The report mentioned that at a time when digital media is dividing Western democracies, China is manipulating online discourse to enforce the ideas and beliefs of the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP).

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Systematic manipulation of information online 

The document containing directives clearly depicts China's effort to control the dissemination of information online, which requires enormous bureaucracy, armies of people, specialized technology made by private contractors, and constant monitoring of digital news outlets and social media platforms, the report said.

Though China has been strongly criticised by the United States and other countries for trying to cover up the extent of the outbreak in its early stages, these documents indicate that the CCP tried to control the Covid-19 narrative to underplay the severity of the virus and make the authorities appear more responsible.

Several Chinese news outlets were also instructed not to display reports on foreign donations and overseas purchases of medical supplies, as they can disrupt the country’s procurement efforts. "Avoid giving the false impression that our fight against the epidemic relies on foreign donations," one directive said

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Xi sets up Cyberspace Administration to censor online content

The report states that Chinese President Xi Jinping created the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) in 2014 to centralise the management of internet censorship and propaganda as well as other aspects of digital policy. It also informs that the government departments of CCP have a variety of specialized software available to shape what people see on online platforms.

The report also mentioned that CAC ordered offices to start purging internal reports, related to Covid-19 after some confidential public-opinion analysis reports surfaced online.

China has been widely criticised across the world for its alleged role in the spread of the novel coronavirus that has infected over 75 million people and killed over 1.6 million people worldwide.

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