[Breakage]

China's Internet awash with state spies (280K of pro-Chicom Internet shills)
Asia Times ^ | 08/14/08 | Wu Zhong

Posted on Friday, September 05, 2008 7:07:26 AM by TigerLikesRooster

China's Internet awash with state spies

By Wu Zhong, China Editor

HONG KONG - An innovative Internet-based "profession" of state-outsourced web commentators is flourishing under the guidance of the Chinese government, according to the latest edition of the Far Eastern Economic Review (FEER).

As the article, titled "China's Guerrilla War for the Web", reports: They have been called the "Fifty Cent Party", the "Red Vests" and the "Red Vanguard". But China's growing armies of web commentators - instigated, trained and financed by Communist Party organizations - have just one mission: to safeguard the interests of the party by infiltrating and policing a rapidly growing Chinese Internet. They set out to neutralize undesirable public opinion by pushing pro-party views through chat rooms and web forums, reporting dangerous content to authorities. [1] The so-called "Fifty Cent Party", or wumaodang, is more

commonly known by its literal translation as the "Five Mao Party" - a derogatory term applied to the pro-party bloggers by other Chinese Internet users. According to the FEER report, "Rumors traveled quickly across the Internet that these Party-backed monitors received 50 mao, or roughly seven US cents, for each positive post they made."

The allegations of receiving such meager pay for posting propagandistic opinions has only worsened online perceptions of the "Five-Mao Party". The unfriendly nickname itself is telling: the official commentary army - estimated by the FEER article "to comprise as many as 280,000 members nationwide" - is most unpopular among regular Internet users.