Parents in China told to delete encrypted messaging apps from kids’ phones to prevent inadvertent role in online scams

Encrypted messaging apps are a ‘grey zone’, as criminals can easily destroy proof, police in multiple Chinese cities warn in social media posts
Kids fooled into chatting with them may be regarded as assisting internet crimes, the posts say, urging that parents delete such apps

Censorship in China

Hayley Wong

Published: 12:00pm, 23 May 2023

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Police in China have urged parents to delete encrypted messaging apps from their children’s smartphones to prevent the youngsters inadvertently becoming an “accomplice” to fraud.

The social media accounts of local police forces around the country have been circulating messages since last week warning against children using instant messaging apps like the long-blocked Telegram and domestically founded BatChat.

Online fraud on “foreign encrypted messaging apps” or “in-country non-mainstream apps” involved an “extremely” complex process that made investigation difficult, the Nanjing city public security bureau said in one of the earliest postings.

The police force in the eastern city is one of about a dozen countrywide found by the Post to have issued such warnings.

Other texting apps to be guarded against included Seagull, Shimida and Miliaomao, all founded in China and allowed behind its Great Firewall, as well as WhatsApp and Twitter, which are banned and can only be accessed over a virtual private network.

Encrypted messenger Signal is banned in China, joining WhatsApp and Telegram

The encryption function, which translates chat data into codes to avoid unauthorised access, together with the “delete after reading” function, had made it easier for criminals to destroy evidence, Nanjing police said in its post, warning that users of the apps were operating in a “grey zone”.

“Criminals will use flowery language to coax adolescents to reveal private information, causing them to become accomplices,” it cautioned, as it urged parents to delete the apps.

Exchanges with such “criminals” could be regarded as assisting internet crimes, punishable by jail terms of up to three years, it said.

Police units on city and district levels around the country have urged parents to only keep school-related apps in their children’s electronic devices, and to educate them about online fraud, which could come in the form of interface design giveaways, easy money schemes, or “fandom opportunity offers” – such as perks for joining celebrity fan clubs.

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Online fraudsters had switched from major texting apps with in-country service providers to foreign ones, said posts from police forces in multiple localities, including the southwestern city of Chengdu and a district in the southern city of Guiyang.

All major foreign messaging apps are blocked by China, leaving tech giant Tencent-owned super app WeChat to dominate the market.

But the widely popular app has been met with privacy fears, especially after authorities tightened censorship of conversations about Covid-19. That caused some to switch to secure foreign alternatives like Signal, which was also blocked in 2021.

China has stepped up cybersecurity control in recent years, with its data security and personal information protection laws passed in 2021 highlighting the authorities’ firm intention to protect the domestic internet.

Under the new rules, companies considered critical information infrastructure operators must store data collected in mainland China locally and must undergo security assessment for approval to send any of it overseas.

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