The Beijing Crackdown

Beijing has launched (with increasing aggression) various actions against individuals that have been identified as having contributed to subversive behaviour. The recent case of the Chinese businessman, Lin Hai, owner of a Shanghai-based software company, was sentenced to two years in prison for disseminating 30,000 e-mail addresses to a US-based dissident publication. And another case of the government ordering the closure of an on-line discussion board.

The e-mail list in the Hai case was reportedly used to distribute banned news materials to the owner of the email addresses. Although Hai admitted to disseminating the list, he stated that he did it for commercial purposes. He had no idea of the e-mail list's final use.