Chinese social networks have announced a plan to strip the anonymity of bloggers with half a million subscribers

The most popular social networks in China have offered to display the real names of users who have more than 500 thousand subscribers. We are talking about bloggers who publish news and information that is inconsistent with the state. In China, such bloggers are called Webmedia.

Among users of social networks, the measure has raised concerns because it could lead to widespread doxing and privacy violations. Doxing is the publication of personal information identifying a person or organization, for example, a home address or phone number.

In recent years, Chinese regulators have taken tough measures against WeMedia content in order to "cleanse" the country's cyberspace.

WeChat, Weibo, Douyin (Chinese version of TikTok), Baidu, Xiaohongshu, Bilibili have released separate publications announcing the new measures.

Former Chinese state media editor Hu Xijin defends the new policy. Influential sources should take responsibility for what they say, Hu believes.

Weibo CEO Wang Gaofei promised that the measures will not apply to accounts that have less than 500 thousand subscribers. ByteDance, which owns Douyin, said the company would not request anything other than real names. Only verified accounts will have access to this information.

The new policy will deprive thousands of influential people on social networks, which are used by hundreds of millions of Chinese, of anonymity. Representatives of the platforms noted that first of all they deanonymize accounts with more than 1 million subscribers. Those who refuse to cooperate with the sites will be limited in online traffic and income.