"China removes anonymity of bloggers' accounts with more than 500,000 followers", 31 October 2023

China's most popular social media platforms on Tuesday announced that "self-media" accounts with more than 500,000 followers will be asked to display real-name information, a controversial measure that has prompted concerns over doxxing and privacy among some users.

"Self-media" includes news and information not necessarily approved by the government, a genre of online content regulators have cracked down on in recent years to "purify" China's cyberspace...

...Messaging and payment app WeChat, microblogging platform Weibo, Douyin, China's version of Tik Tok, search engine giant Baidu, social e-commerce app Xiaohongshu, video sharing website Bilibili, among others, published separate statements on Tuesday.

Rumours of the new policy had prompted lively debate among users...[some] have expressed concerns that the measure would make doxxing easier and platforms would further remove online users' anonymity in the future...

...Bytedance's Douyin said on Tuesday that it would not ask for anything besides real names and that it would only allow verified accounts to view such information, adding that accounts deemed "risky" or "abnornal" would be prevented from seeing others' real names.

The new measures will remove the anonymity of thousands of influencers on social media platforms that are used daily by hundreds of millions of Chinese.