China's Internet police have claimed tangible results in the "people's war" against online pornography with the help of tip-offs, but they only scratched the surface, state media reported on Tuesday.
A month-long crackdown against online p*rn sponsored by 10 ministries had shut down 300 Web sites and deleted 10,200 links to pornographic Web sites and 10,000 online "p*rn games," the China Daily said, citing the Ministry of Public Security.
"Determined to protect their huge profits, p*rn distributors will do anything to avoid detection," the paper quoted Li Baozhong, an official with the General Administration of Press and Publication, as saying.
"They are becoming more and more insidious," Li said.
In April, Chinese President Hu Jintao launched a campaign to rid the country's unruly Internet of "unhealthy" content and make it a platform for Communist Party doctrine.
China's burgeoning Internet population reached 137 million in 2006, up
23 percent on the year before.But despite a vast system of filters and tens of thousands of Internet monitors employed to wipe out salacious content and ideas contrary to Communist ideology, pornography remains prevalent in Chinese cyberspace.
"It is a constant battle to uncover the latest tricks," Li said, adding that the country's banking regulator had been recruited to cut off p*rn operators' funding channels.
Li said a new system regulating Internet content and limiting the amount of time the nation's youth could spend online was expected to be launched next month.
China in April released a string of regulations aimed at curbing excessive online-game playing to curb Internet addiction in the nation's youth, including a real name and identity registration system, but within weeks, newspapers had printed articles about the ease of subverting the regime.
Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited.
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