China cracks down on over 1 million social media posts, accounts

China said it took action on more than 1 million social media posts and accounts in its latest campaign to moderate online content that it regards as malicious.

Authorities permanently banned 66,000 accounts and cracked down on 928,000 others in the drive that started in March, China’s cyberspace regulator said in a statement on Saturday. Within those accounts, it also acted on more than 1.41 million online posts as of May 22.

Violations included accounts or posts that were spreading rumors, impersonating government or news outlets or misusing social causes for profit.

Under a pledge to cultivate a benign online environment and tackle content deemed harmful to the society, Beijing has stepped up regulatory moves targeting misinterpreting financial information, child exploitation or the potential abuse of algorithms in social media. 

The crackdown on online content is also a part of a broad tightening of regulation over the tech sector that weighed on internet giants including Tencent Holdings Ltd., Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and ByteDance Ltd., operators of the most popular commercial platforms for Chinese social media users.

China will continue to punish illegal activities on social media and deal with websites and platforms that fail to efficiently rectify such deeds according to the law, the regulator said in the statement.