Chinese social network Weibo bans “vulgar” usernames

The Chinese social network Weibo, similar to Twitter, announced the ban on “vulgar” usernames that contain words such as “niangpao” (a derogatory way of referring to an effeminate man) or “idiot”, the Hong Kong media reported today South China Morning Post.

Weibo announced this Sunday that it will apply these filters to “Reinforce the construction of a civilized Internet” and in line with the requirements of Chinese regulators, points out the Hong Kong media.

The social network claims it has already warned users whose name does not meet the new guidelines so that they altered it and that it has changed the names of those Internet users who had not corrected it in time.

The next goal, Weibo states, It is the cleaning of the “vulgar” content that exists in the profile photos and the presentations of the users.

Weibo has already received numerous slaps on the wrist from regulators in 2021: recently, it created a task force dedicated to “identifying and intercepting” soft porn content. after receiving a warning from the authoritiess, who have fined him up to 44 times this year for a total of 14.3 million yuan (2.3 million dollars, 2 million euros).

The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC, the country’s cyber regulator) indicated that one of its senior officials had met with a Weibo representative to demand “immediate rectification” after allowing the publication of “serious content” prohibited by national laws.

The eight bans of Weibo, the “Chinese Twitter”

Weibo then assured that he would “sincerely accept the criticism” of the CAC and promised “to apply the requirements with determination.” On December 8, Weibo held a secondary IPO in Hong Kong.

According to company data, the network has more than 500 million active users every month in China, where Twitter is inaccessible. (I)