From January 2 to 13 2017, His Holiness the Dalai Lama is holding a popular Tibetan Buddhist teaching called Kalachakra in Bodh Gaya, India. Increased restrictions from the government of China has barred Tibetans in Tibet from attending the teachings. This report documents blocking of Kalachakra-related keywords on WeChat revealing how restrictions on the ritual extend online.

Citizen Lab Researcher Lotus Ruan was interviewed by VOA Mandarin on the recent release of the report entitled “One App Two Systems, How WeChat uses one censorship policy in China and another internationally.”

多伦多大学公民实验室的最新报告揭露了微信平台的审查机制。微信是中国腾讯控股有限公司旗下的即时通讯应用，目前是中国最受欢迎的聊天软件之一，也是全球排名第四的最流行聊天软件

In this report we provide the first systematic study of keyword and website censorship on WeChat, the most popular chat app in China

In an interview with the Daily Dot, Citizen Lab Research Manager Masashi Crete-Nishihata commented on the challenges Tibetans face in using social media and other online tools to spread content considered politically sensitive by the Chinese government.

This report is an analysis of the types of content removed by WeChat on its public accounts (also known as “official accounts”) blogging platform.

This post is an introduction to Asia Chats a research project analyzing
information controls and privacy in mobile messaging applications used
in Asia. The project will produce a series of reports that will begin
with a focus on WeChat, LINE, and KakaoTalk. Reports will include
analysis based on our technical investigation of censorship or
surveillance functionality, assessment of privacy issues surrounding
these applications’ use and storage of user data, and comparison of the
terms of service and privacy policies of the applications.