Apple

Since our report in August 2021, we find that Apple has eliminated their Chinese political censorship in Taiwan. However, Apple continues to perform broad, keyword-based political censorship outside of mainland China in Hong Kong, despite human rights groups’ recommendations for American companies to resist blocking content.

Within mainland China, we found that Apple censors political content including broad references to Chinese leadership and China’s political system, names of dissidents and independent news organizations, and general terms relating to religions, democracy, and human rights. And across all six regions, we found that Apple’s content moderation practices pertaining to derogatory, racist, or sexual content are inconsistently applied and that Apple’s public-facing documents failed to explain how it derives their keyword lists.