中英对照：你在帮助微信对其在中国的用户进行监控

（大中报/096.ca特稿）：在过去发表的文章中，我提到永远不会在我的笔记本电脑或手机上安装微信和Zoom这两个软件。我也在大中报上发表了多篇有关ZOOM安全不足和隐私问题的文章。

As I have mentioned earlier in one of my articles, WeChat 微信and Zoom are two pieces of software that I will never install on my Laptop and/or cell phone. I have already presented many articles on ZOOM's security inadequacies and privacy issues in this newspaper.

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微信应用程序由中国最大的科技公司之一腾讯拥有和运营。它于2011年作为传播即时新闻而推出。无可争议的是，微信对中国注册的账户进行全面的内容监控。现在，技术测试表明，海外注册的微信帐户也已受到监控。那些在海外注册微信账户之间流行的、中国政府敏感的政治图片和文字均在监控之内。

The application WeChat is owned and operated by Tencent, one of China’s largest technology companies, and was launched in 2011 as a mobile instant messaging application. The fact that WeChat communications are subject to pervasive content surveillance for China-registered accounts is indisputable. Now, results from technical experiments have revealed that WeChat communications among non-China-registered accounts are also subject to monitoring. Documents and images transmitted entirely among non-China-registered accounts undergo content surveillance wherein these files are analyzed for content that is politically sensitive in China.

从公开的信息来看，目前还不清楚腾讯如何使用微信海外账号的数据来审查内容。当然，腾讯将不会说明如何和为什么要用海外用户的数据来对中国国内的用户进行监控。

From public information, it is unclear how Tencent uses non-Chinese-registered users’ data to enable content blocking. Of course, Tencent will not clarify how and why data from international users is used to enable political censorship of the platform in China.



过去十年的研究表明，中国会定期审查国内的在线平台，以确保他们遵守政府的规定。这些被审查的中国公司中有许多已经进入了海外市场。因此，这些海外平台也在中国政府的监控之下。视频社交平台抖音已经被指控它审查其平台上对中国敏感的内容。中国拥有的同性恋，双性恋，跨性别者在线约会平台Grindr也被怀疑被监控，跟踪或平台以其他方式危害美国用户。

Research over the past decade has shown how online platforms in China are routinely censored to comply with government regulations. Many of these Chinese companies grow into markets beyond China and their activities are coming under scrutiny for the reason above. TikTok, a video-based social media company, has been accused of censoring content on its platform that would be sensitive in China. Grindr, a Chinese-owned online dating platform for gay, bi, trans, and queer people, fell under suspicion that it could be used to monitor, track, or otherwise endanger American users.

在中国数老大的微信是世界第三大热门社交媒体平台。在中国，微信不能有那些中国政府法律禁止的相关内容。微信努力在不突破中国政府的红线和吸引海外用户之间找平衡。在中国，微信通过用户电话号码注册账号来对他们管理和监控。微信不会告诉用户其内容已经被监控，尤其是对正在发生的事情进行监控。

WeChat is the third most popular social media platform in the world and first in China. In China, WeChat is expected to follow rules and regulations from Chinese authorities around prohibited content. WeChat is playing a balancing act as it attempts to keep within government red lines in China and attract users internationally. WeChat implements censorship for users with accounts registered to mainland China phone numbers. This censorship is done without notification to users and is dynamically updated, often in response to current events.



此前，没有证据表明微信的审查功能会触及那些没有用中国电话号码注册的用户。这些用户可以发送和接收那些在中国注册的用户无法发送和接收的消息。但科学测试表明，海外注册帐户共享的文档和图像会被监控，这些文档和图像会被用于监控和审查中国注册帐户的用户。

Previously, there was no evidence that WeChat's censorship features affected users with accounts that are not registered to China-based phone numbers. These users could send and receive messages that users with China-registered accounts could not. Scientific testing is now showing that documents and images shared among non-China-registered accounts are subject to content surveillance and are used to build up the database WeChat uses to censor China-registered accounts.

腾讯的隐私协议和政策文件对有关内容监控的功能含糊其辞。因此，用户无法确定什么样的内容和为什么这样的内容会被监控。因此，通过微信发送敏感内容的海外用户可能在无意中在帮助微信对中国用户的监控。

Tencent does not provide clear reference or explanation of the content surveillance features in their privacy agreements and policy documents. Therefore, users cannot determine if what, and why, content surveillance was being applied. Consequently, non-China-based users who send sensitive content over WeChat may be unwittingly contributing to political censorship in China.

我将在下一篇文章里分析微信监控的细节，以及微信是如何利用无辜的海外用户帮助他们来监控中国国内的用户的。

Next time, we will look into the details of this censorship scheme that takes advantage of innocent foreign registered users' accounts and how it manipulates them to assist in the improvement of China's sinister censoring system.