- published: 28 Dec 2015
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The Great Firewall of China (Simplified Chinese: 防火长城; traditional Chinese: 防火長城; pinyin: fánghuǒ chángchéng, commonly known as 墻 "wall") is a blanket term with ironic connotations thought to have been coined in an article in Wired magazine in 1997 and used by international, including Chinese, media to refer to legislation and projects initiated by the Chinese government (which is controlled by the Communist Party of China, CPC) that attempt to regulate the internet in Mainland China. It is the main instrument to achieve Internet censorship in China. These CPC regulations include criminalizing certain online speech and activities, blocking from view selected websites, and filtering key words out of searches initiated from computers located in Mainland China.
While the United States and several other western countries passed laws criminalizing computer crimes beginning in the 1970s, China had no such legislation until 1997. That year, China's sole legislative body, the National People's Congress (NPC) passed CL97, a law that criminalizes "cyber crimes" (计算机犯罪; jisuanji fanzui), which it divided into two broad categories: crimes that target computer networks and crimes carried out over computer networks. Behavior illegal under the latter category includes among many things the dissemination of pornographic material and the usurping of "state secrets."