China’s microblogs to implement real name registration by March 16

“Earlier in August (2011), a senior official from Beijing has visited Sina’s headquarter and issued a warning to them over its Weibo microblogging services, as its spreading influence has threatened their media controls and its growing power is changing the traditional media outlets tightly controlled and directed by the Government.

Further to the above sign, at the sixth meeting of Central Committee of the CCP that started on this Saturday (October 15, 2011), the country’s cultural reforms and development issues, which focus on the control over the media and the Internet, will be discussed.” China Buzz reported in October, 2011.

Now the real-name registration regulation on the microblogging services was finally handed down by the Central government to demand Sina, Sohu, Netease and Tencent, four Chinese major portals, to make users register (on the microblogging services provided by the four portals) with their real names and ID numbers starting from March 16, 2012.

The current users will have to submit their names by the date too, in order to have permission to post or repost microblog entries. However, users can choose to not display their real names publicly, but just their screen names.

Reportedly, 65 percent of Chinese netizens created the microblog accounts, and the total number of the accounts has surpassed 0.32 billion.