The total voter turnover rate of the 2019 District Council Election is 71.20%, making it the most participated election recorded in Hong Kong. With more than 2,940,000 voters, the number of voters this year is doubled compared to that of the District Council Election in 2015.
By Howard Li
The 2019 Hong Kong District Council elections are approaching. This year’s elections have seen a lot of young faces emerge. Some of them are former student activists who led the 2014 Umbrella Movement. Five years on, after experiencing the depressing ending of the campaign which failed to achieve any concessions from the government and witnessing Beijing’s tightening grip on the city’s freedoms, especially the disqualifications of young opposition lawmakers, will the Umbrella Generation still regard the elections as an opportunity to make a difference?
Varsity talks to two former student activists who run for the coming District Council elections, Tiffany Yuen Ka-wai and Lester Shum Ngo-fai, to learn about their perspectives and visions.
“A choice for Tin Wan”
Tiffany Yuen Ka-wai, former Vice Chairperson of pro-democracy Demosisto party, is contesting the seat in Southern District Council for Tin Wan constituency. She is now serving as an assistant to legislator Au Nok-hin.
Standing next to her campaign banner bearing a slogan, “A choice for Tin Wan”, Yuen says Tin Wan constituency has been a stronghold of the pro-establishment camp for many years and she wants to give residents one more option in the upcoming election. “I like Tin Wan because I enjoy warmness and friendliness of residents here,” she adds.
There are various problems in Tin Wan that remain unsolved. This year, Wycombe Abbey International School has rented space at Tin Wan Shopping Centres, the district’s only shopping centre which has been left idle for more than two years after Link REIT sold it to a mainland-based company in 2015. As a result, the mall cannot be fully utilised to meet residents’ needs.
Traffic congestion is another concern. “Early on, there were many tour groups visiting Tin Wan, which led to increasing burden on the public transport,” Yuen says.
If elected, Yuen pledges to press the government for policies which could improve the living conditions of Tin Wan’s residents.
“Although I may seem too young and inexperienced to be a district councillor in the eyes of many residents, I think having the passion for serving the community is more important,” says the 26-year-old. “I make every effort to listen to the residents and spend much time in dealing with community affairs to win confidence from them.”
Yuen says her decision of running for the election is not facilitated by the ongoing anti-government protests, but she adds that the protests may have politicised the elections which typically centre on community matters and prompt voters to be inclined towards the pro-democracy camp.
“Still, we will focus on fundamental livelihood issues without adding political spice into them. But at the same time, we shall explain our stances and current political situation to the residents instead of shying away from doing this for fear of being labelled as ‘radicals’ or ‘troublemakers’ by them,” says Yuen.
Speaking of the series of strikes, class boycotts and shutdown of shops, Yuen says they are important in exerting political pressure on the government to respond to protesters’ demands. She thinks Hong Kong people should strive together to sustain the pressure.
As a former student activist who actively took part in the 2014 Occupy movement, Yuen says the movement has equipped her with stronger communication skills which help her better convey political views to the residents in her community.
She stresses that the Occupy movement does have an impact on the current pro-democracy protests as this civil disobedience campaign which happened half a decade ago has gone down in Hong Kong’s history as an important lesson in civic engagement and will continue to serve as a mirror to future social movements.
Determination to change
The significance of the Occupy movement also finds an echo in Lester Shum Ngo-fai’s political career. Shum, former deputy secretary-general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students and one of the key student leaders of the 79-day occupation, is now campaigning to win Hoi Bun constituency seat of Tsuen Wan District Council. He currently serves as an assistant to lawmaker Eddie Chu Hoi-dick.
“On the positive side, the movement encourages more people to pay attention to politics. On the other hand, people are frustrated as their efforts hasn’t paid off. The political divide gets deeper and deeper in the aftermath of the movement. But it is an experience in the past which won’t be written off,” Shum comments on the Umbrella movement he once played a leading role in but ultimately faltered.
The 26-year-old decided to throw his hat in the ring for district councillor this April. At the time, he considered the election as a way to change the status quo given the society’s lack of confidence in starting another large-scale social movement since the Occupy Central campaign ended in failure.
Should he be elected, Shum says he will help improve the recycling mechanism in his district.
The three-coloured waste separation bins placed in the communities do not perform very well in sorting out different kinds of waste materials. Shum says it is also very discouraging to see the endeavour made by residents to clean up bottles for convenience of reclamation is in vain since all the waste is eventually ended up in the landfill.
He is told by the residents that setting up a reclamation depot could resolve the problems above, but he hasn’t outlined any concrete plan yet. Shum explains, “Waste management concerns many parties, including management companies, cleaning companies and so on. It also takes a long time to negotiate with different parties and reach the consensus to look for solutions. The first step is to get elected.”
Following the months-long protests in the city, Shum becomes more determined to win the election. “Every pan-democracy candidate is fighting against Beijing and trying to secure as many seats as possible. If I lose the election, I will feel that I fail my supporters as well as the people who have devoted themselves into the social movement,” says Shum. He adds that his reputation established in the Umbrella movement allows him to gain trust from voters easily.
As for the 2020 Legislative Council election, both Shum and Yuen say they haven’t decided whether to stand in it or not.
The other candidate for Tin Wan constituency is Chan Fu-ming. The other candidates for Hoi Bun constituency are Mok Yuen-kwan, Timmy Chow Ping-tim and Leo Chan Yue-hai.
Edited by Gloria Li
In this series of infographics, Varsity presents an overview of how the District Council voting system works.
Varsity takes a look at the composition and competition for the District Council before election day (November 24). Here are a few key points.
Hong Kong has been plagued by ongoing “leaderless and be water” protests as protesters plan every rally with a fluid and decentralized organizational structure through the help of modern communication technologies.
Hong Kong has been plagued by ongoing “leaderless and be water” protests as protesters plan every rally with a fluid and decentralized organizational structure through the help of modern communication technologies.
The latest wave of protests stemmed from as far as February when the government proposed an amendment to the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance, regarding special arrangements for the transfer of fugitives. Human rights groups and other organizations voiced concerns that fugitives extradited to China would suffer from arbitrary detention and unfair trial under China’s judicial system.
The extradition bill set off a chain of anti-government protests, also known as the Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill (Anti-ELAB) Movement, with over one million people who took to the street peacefully on June 9. But the protests took a grim turn in mid-June, when police began to use rubber bullets and tear gas on protesters. Suppressed tensions and distrust, enshrouded after the 2014 Umbrella Movement, resurfaced in the form of flash-mob style protests.
Once again, the city has spiralled into widespread protests, albeit in a different form. In this issue, Varsity looks into the impact of information dissemination and privacy data awareness in the Anti-ELAB Movement.
Local protesters utilise communication and forum applications, such as LIHKG and Telegram, to organise protests and communicate with each other. We speak with organisers, protesters, and experts about how protest coordination is developing in this uncertain political landscape.
Simultaneous to the fast organisation on various online platforms, information is spread to the international community through news reports and social media activism. Activists are also using creative ways to illustrate the situation in Hong Kong. We talk to international activists about discussion abroad and the conflicts that accompany them.
Awareness and concerns with privacy increased following the rapid dissemination of information. Many protesters use extra SIM cards and are often seen in black attire and sanitary masks, even at peaceful protests. We take a look at how protesters protect their identities, the root of their distrust, and the extent of data protection from privacy laws.
Varsity’s reporters and editors worked hard with devotion on this issue. While the government announced on September 4 it would formally withdraw the extradition bill, the fight continues all around us. We may often find ourselves met with suppression, hopelessness, confusion and division. However, even with the conflicts this division brings, we see that each individual cares for this city greatly, in their own way.
We hope this issue may reflect on how our lives have changed, shed light on the developments the protests have gone through, and bring about healthy discussion regarding our city’s future.
Johanna Chan
Hong Kong protesters turn to social media to organise and mobilise themselves
By Lambert Siu
Telegram on the front line
Davis, a fourth-year university student, who declines to reveal his full name, participates as a frontline protester in the anti-extradition bill protests, which have gripped the city for months. Like many other Hong Kong young people, the 21-year-old takes to the streets to demand political self-determination and autonomy of this city.
Different from conventional social movements, this pro-democracy campaign sparked by a controversial and now-abandoned bill is leaderless, faceless and nameless. Without veteran political leaders directing courses of action, this time, Hong Kong protesters adopt a citizen self-mobilisation approach: they turn to social media platforms to organise themselves.
“We acquire information from Telegram and discuss our next steps at the scene accordingly,” Davis says, describing how he communicates and makes decisions collectively with other frontline protesters. He says they freely share their opinions on the spot and those who are more familiar with the area they are in will point out some secret escape routes only residents of that particular district know.
Telegram is an encrypted messaging app which allows users to create public channels to share information. Users can also create smaller private chat groups to have conversations without displaying their telephone numbers or identities so that they can be protected from potential monitoring by authorities. This app has become one of the most downloaded apps in the city amid the ongoing protests, according to mobile data provider Sensor Tower.
Some public channels which provide instant information on the movement, have up to more than 200,000 subscribers, representing over 2 per cent of Hong Kong’s entire population. The information usually comes from news reports and citizens who call themselves “sentries”, tipping off the channels first-hand updates about locations of police and traffic situations. The immediate access to information facilitates protesters’ wildcat and guerrilla-like actions, which invokes the Bruce Lee-inspired “Be Water” philosophy.
Davis says sometimes frontline protesters quarrel with each other because of their different views on what to do next. “But if someone starts taking action, we will end our arguments,” he says. “We don’t reproach other protesters as we stick to the principle of ‘not splitting up’.”
The Hong Kong protesters have demonstrated strong solidarity by minimising any possible negative impact on the movement and it is illustrated by how they treat misinformation circulating online. Davis says protesters rarely vote on Telegram to decide their next moves during protests because they worry about making wrong decisions if they rely too much on the unverified news spreading on social media. Instead, they tend to judge by their own observations at protest sites.
Davis was once misled by a Telegram message saying that legions of riot police had arrived at the scene. But the fact was that there were only one or two police cars. “Sometimes it is very hard to verify authenticity of information, but it’s not a big problem,” says Davis. “If there is something really serious happening, the whole world would know that. Mistakes only exist in some petty things.”
Virtual Command Centres: LIHKG and Telegram
According to an onsite survey conducted by the Centre for Communication and Public Opinion Survey of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), 41.8 per cent of the respondents who took part in the march organised by Civil Human Rights Front on August 18 always used Telegram to acquire information related to the protests, while 57.3 per cent of those surveyed always obtained information from another online platform LIHKG. Dubbed “Hong Kong Reddit”, this online forum is crowned as one of the virtual command centres of the decentralised movement, in which protesters discuss protest tactics and organise protest activities.
The onsite survey found that these social media sites are embraced not just by the youth but also by the older generation, who are often regarded as technology laggards. More than a third of the respondents aged 50 and above said that they always used LIHKG to acquire information.
Florence, a middle-aged housewife who refuses to disclose her full name, first learned about the two messaging apps from young protesters in the June 12 demonstration, during which thousands gathered around the Legislative Council Complex as an attempt to stop the extradition bill’s second reading. “When I saw the frontline protesters building mills barriers, I wanted to know what their next moves were. That was why I downloaded these apps,” she says.
Florence is not a newcomer to social movements. She joined marches in the city whenever huge issues arose, including the demonstration in support of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, the anti-Article 23 protest in 2003 and the Umbrella Movement in 2014. But she was never a core player in any of these movements.
“This time it’s different. It is a leaderless movement. Everyone can start up something,” Florence says.
She initiated a HK$10 million “Sue the Abuser” crowdfunding campaign together with her friends to help victims sue police officers over their alleged mistreatment. They talk in small groups on Telegram, coordinating logistics and publicity of the project.
As a beginner at Telegram and LIHKG, Florence says learning how to use these applications is not difficult for her because their design is simple. “The first thing I do after waking up is to check Telegram on my phone,” she says. She reads Telegram messages as daily news because the public channels will sum up what happened the night before.
As for LIHKG, this app allows its community members to vote up and down on all the threads, making the most popular posts appear on the forum’s front page. Florence says the function helps her save time by screening out useless topics.
Set up in late 2016, this online forum was once widely used by university students where they discussed everything from gaming to dating. After the large-scale anti-government movement broke out, this forum has become a major discussion space for protesters to campaign protest ideas and strategies, in which freedom of speech is emphasised and the practice of anonymity gives users a sense of security.
Florence often browses LIHKG to check out details of protest activities. She says social media enables her to learn more information about the movement.
From online to offline
Some other LIHKG users are thinking about how to transform an online brainwave into offline political energy in the communities. Yoyo is one of the convenors of Hi! Freedom, a platform providing assistance and support for political amateurs who will run in the upcoming District Council elections as first-time candidates. Along with some of his friends, he wrote a post on LIHKG this June, appealing to netizens to stand for the November election and replace pro-establishment district councillors who were elected uncontested four years ago.
“I was once in despair about Hong Kong society, but this time I see hope in the movement,” says Yoyo.
After millions of people flooded the streets on June 16, mounting resistance to the Chief Executive’s governance, an idea popped up into Yoyo’s mind: “There are two million people on the streets. Can we bring their power to the district councils?” Four days later, he posted the first post on LIHKG and recruited the first squad of volunteers via the online forum.
Yoyo and his teammates actually employ multiple social media networks. After absorbing new blood into the team, they created several smaller chat groups on Telegram based on constituencies and work categories. They also opened a Facebook page for Hi! Freedom earning around 6,700 likes.
Features of decentralised leadership
Professor Francis Lee Lap-fung, school director of CUHK’s School of Journalism and Communication, thinks the widespread popularity of these two online platforms during the months-long social movement is rooted in their “self-enforcement dynamics”, which means that the more users the platforms attract, the greater value they have. Functioning as a cycle, when these platforms play an increasingly important role in mobilising protesters, more and more people will turn to them in return.
He says this online-driven and leaderless organisation model can generate public enthusiasm to get involved in the movement. “All the people think of is how they can contribute to the movement in their own way, which opens up more possibilities for innovations in protest tactics,” Lee says. “A stronger sense of engagement also helps sustain the participants’ support for the movement,” he adds.
On October 31, the High Court of Hong Kong issued an interim injunction to bar the public from publishing any messages online that encourages or incites violence that could do harm to individuals or cause damage to their property. This temporary injunction remains in force until November 15 when a formal hearing is held. The ban applicable to any online platforms specifically cites LIHKG and Telegram as examples at the request of the Department of Justice.
Edited by Gloria Li
Ordinary citizens from different countries join hands to campaign for
the Anti-ELAB movement in the international community
By Kayi Tsang, Wayne Chang
During the anti-extradition law amendment bill (anti-ELAB) movement, activists and celebrities attend seminars and conferences in different parts of the world to speak for Hong Kong protesters, while ordinary citizens join hands in their own ways to inform people outside Hong Kong about what is happening in the city.
#Anti-elab, #FreeHongKong and #HongKongPolice are some of the many hashtags Hong Kong netizens use on Twitter, Reddit and Facebook to draw global attention to the movement. They also crowdfund advertisements in overseas newspapers and launch a petition to the White House calling on the U.S. Congress to review the existing extradition agreement with Hong Kong. Gradually, the antiELAB movement has evolved from local protests demanding withdrawal of the bill to a global movement to ‘liberate Hong Kong’.
“Share” it now
Taiwanese artist JieJie is one of those who join the global campaign in support of the movement. He is a co-founder of a popular Facebook page JieJie and UncleCat, which publishes illustrations and has more than 500,000 followers. During the anti-ELAB movement, JieJie has created illustrations on his page with captions explaining the chain of events in Hong Kong, including conflicts between protesters and the police.
His illustrations feature the July 21 incident in which a group of suspected gangsters attacked ordinary citizens at Yuen Long train station and the protest on October 1 during which a policeman shot a young protester with live ammunition have been widely circulated with more than 15,000 and 17,000 shares on Facebook respectively. Through his comic style illustration, JieJie wants to depict brutality and violence reported in news which he finds outrageous in a less stressful manner for his audience who cannot stand looking at bloody pictures and videos.
Although the antiELAB movement mainly takes place in Hong Kong, JieJie thinks it is closely related to Taiwan not only because of the close geographical distance, but also the purpose and meaning of the movement – to resist the system of the Chinese Communist party and fight for democracy.
Responding to his followers’ requests, JieJie translates captions attached with his drawings into English and Japanese with the help of his friends in order to reach out to a wider audience. “I hope my drawings can encourage Hong Kong people and tell people around the world about the seriousness and absurdness of some incidents in Hong Kong,” JieJie says.
Sharing news stories
JieJie is not alone in this journey. Adeline Bong shares his mission of informing her fellow countrymen in Malaysia about what is happening in Hong Kong and reasons behind the protests.
Bong, a Malaysian student who is currently studying at the Chinese University of Hong Kong keeps posting about the movement on her Instagram every day and hopes that her Malaysian friends can understand what is happening before judging or accusing the protesters. Bong says many Malaysians, including her parents, stand against the protesters after reading news stories by Malaysian media outlets.
She has been following news about the movement closely since June by reading posts shared by her Hong Kong friends on Facebook and Instagram. She also participated in several major protests herself.
Bong says that Malaysians, including her friends and family, do not understand the anti-ELAB movement in Hong Kong due to the failure of their local media in reporting how the movement comes into being. “When they report, they do not explain the ins and outs of the whole issue. They only say the airport was congested with 5,000 protesters or conflicts between the police and civilians… because it’s not local news,” she says.
Witnessing numerous protests in Hong Kong with her own eyes, Bong can tell that civil awareness in her home country is low, as people rarely speak up or take to the street regarding social issues. ‘I hope the core values of Hong Kong, like democracy and freedom can be granted completely by the end of the movement,’ she says. ‘If Hong Kong wins the battle, it will be a good role model for us (Malaysians).’
Connecting the West
The anti-ELAB movement does not only concern people living in Hong Kong or its neighbouring countries, but also many ethnic Chinese living around the world. In London, Toronto, Vancouver and other major cities where Mainland Chinese and Hong Kong immigrants inhabit, assemblies and prayer meetings took place in support of the demonstrations in Hong Kong.
Elliott Cheung is a second-generation immigrant in Vancouver. He had lived in Hong Kong, his place of origin, for five years when he was a child. Currently studying in Taiwan, Cheung has kept his fingers on the pulse of the Anti-ELAB movement since its outbreak. While embracing both parts of his Hong Kong-Canadian identity, Cheung says the movement has galvanized his Hongkonger identity and he feels the urge to defend and stand up for that part of him.
From where he lives and studies, Cheung has seen how Chinese societies in different parts of the world are affected by the situation in Hong Kong. “Divisions in overseas Chinese community in Vancouver, particularly between Mainlanders and Hongkongers, have erupted to the surface,” he says. Cheung also acknowledges that his local-born Canadian friends consider the movement as a Chinese problem and is not closely related to them.
Despite different reactions from his multinational friends, Cheung believes that it is essential for the AntiELAB movement to reach out for more global support and attention. He often discusses the issue with his friends and shares news about the movement on social media platforms in an attempt to inform people around him. In response to the shouts from Hong Kong protesters, Cheung attended the Global Anti-Totalitarianism in Taipei on September 29 as well as a student event at his university on October 1.
Cheung thinks there is a unique role for those who are staying overseas or have emigrated and still care about Hong Kong like himself, to actively help people they know to understand the situation in Hong Kong. “I think it is very important for me and for others to continue showing up and speaking out at these events (overseas marches) — for anyone who knows what is happening and feels the injustice of the situation, not to be cowed into silence and inaction,” says Cheung.
— for anyone who knows what is happening and feels the injustice of the situation, not to be cowed into silence and inaction
Kwong Kin-ming, author of Governing Hong Kong: The governance History of Hong Kong in British Colonial Era, acknowledges the intention of arousing global awareness towards the AntiELAB movement through different means, with regard to Hong Kong’s special status in the international stage. “Hong Kong could be the breeding bed for another global economic crisis, since it is an important financial hub in the world,” says Kwong, explaining the reason why the international community should care about Hong Kong’s current situation. He adds that as the city has accommodated multinational businesses, foreign governments would also be concerned with the safety of their people working in Hong Kong, which has already led to discussion in the U.S. Congress.
Kwong believes the Hong Kong- China relation has a fundamental implication on China’s diplomacy with other countries, since Hong Kong’s constitutional principle “One country, Two systems” is promised in the Sino-British Joint Declaration, an international treaty signed by the United Kingdom and China. The current situation in Hong Kong can show whether the Chinese government has kept its promise to honour the international treaty and serve as a reference to show how China handles international treaties and partnership with the rest of the world.
Edited by Raven Hui
Protesters take precautionary measures to protect their privacy.
By Soohyun Kim & Howard Li
Fears underneath the black
As the anti-extradition bill movement continues, a sea of black floods the streets in different parts of Hong Kong nearly every weekend. Hundreds of people wearing black risk their lives every week for the same purpose—to stand up against what they see as creeping interference of Beijing.
Hong Kong, the former British colony which is guaranteed a high degree of autonomy from Beijing until 2047, saw a public backlash against the now withdrawn law that would have allowed people to be extradited to China for trials, throughout the summer.
“Everyone is separating their lives of protesting and normal life,” a front-line protester who prefers to be identified as a recent graduate from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) says.
In a bid to protect his own privacy, he wears “Black Bloc”, a widely used terminology referring to a black outfit – black T-shirt, black sanitary mask, black cloth – commonly worn by anti-government protesters.
Wearing black is not the only measure he takes to protect his identity and prevent himself from being arrested. He also uses a different cell phone with a different contact book and SIM card that allows him to stay off the grid.
“Even if I get arrested, they (police) can’t find anything from it,” he says.
Another individual near the frontline, a first aider who requested to be identified as a student of the CUHK, worries that the police might spy on him. He says that as a first aider, he does not fear showing his face, but many in his team use fake names and hide their identities from each other.
“It’s not a matter of privacy. We don’t want to be arrested by the police, because what we are doing is breaking the law. If the police don’t arrest us, I don’t think we have to hide our identities,” he says.
Protesters enable alphabetical and biometric locking systems on their smartphones and disable the functioning of whatever surveillance systems they deem could expose their identities. Some change their clothes, use fake names on social media and put up umbrellas during protests to block police’s cameras from capturing their images.
The underlying fear is that revealing their identities at public demonstrations can result in atrocious consequences – getting arrested and charged by the police.
Protesters’ concerns over their identities and personal information are also reflected in their reaction to the smart lamppost project, which was being tested by the Hong Kong government as a part of the smart city development scheme.
Demonstrators view government lampposts with suspicion and they believe it is a measure to step up surveillance. They tore down lampposts in Kowloon Bay, Kwun Tong and Kai Tak in late August, although the government denied the accusation and said that the lampposts were for monitoring weather, traffic conditions and air quality. But many protesters believed they could be traced by lampposts suspected to be equipped with artificial-intelligence-powered surveillance software. They fear identity cards or facial-recognition cameras on poles might expose their whereabouts and what they have done during the movement. They are also worried that their data and personal information might be transferred to the Chinese government.
Protection of individuals’ information
It is, however, unlikely that the government will disclose individuals’ information without consent, according to Michael Jackson, associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong.
Jackson points out Hong Kong has Personal Data Privacy Ordinance (PDPO), a set of technology-neutral and principle-based guidelines that safeguard the privacy of individuals’ data or “any information which relates to a living individual and can be used to identify that individual. It must also exist in a form which accesses to or processing of is practicable.”
As the government is subject to the PDPO, any unintended use of collected data can result in a breach of the ordinance. However, Jackson states that public venues consist of individuals’ privacy interest in a public place, which limits the ability to claim personal privacy rights.
“Once you place yourself out there, it is difficult to argue that the mere collection of your image is a breach of your privacy rights,” he says.
In view of the PDPO, Jackson reckons that the law has not kept up with technology because some protections are not clearly applied to current technological information, such as IP addresses which can reveal one’s location and activity.
In a written reply, Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Stephen Wong Kai-yi says the ordinance is a technology-neutral legislation, which provides room for continued applicability against changes in time.
“Personal data privacy right is not absolute. It has to be balanced by other considerations such as public interest, public safety, public order, and security,” he notes. “The application of data protection principles and provisions of the Ordinance may be exempted in the cases of the prevention or detection of crime, the apprehension, prosecution or detention of offenders.”
Lack of trust
Another increasing concern that protesters have is the lack of trust in the government as law enforcement agents use arbitrary methods to arrest them, as noted by Lokman Tsui, assistant professor at the School of Journalism and Communication in CUHK.
In a poll of 1,023 respondents released by Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute this August, public distrust level of the Hong Kong government hit a historic record with 50.8 per cent showing extreme distrust. This is the highest level since the former British colony was handed back to China in 1997.
“When you have a situation where it’s not clear which law is going to be used (and) how. Then, that creates a lot of distrust and paranoia among the people,” Tsui says.
Tsui thinks surveillance is very one-sided in Hong Kong, meaning that local authorities have laws and technology at their disposal to look at citizens, but citizens have very limited means to monitor the authorities.
“We never know when we are being watched, what they are collecting, how long have they been watching you,” he says.
He points out two situations that aggravate the issue; unclear guidelines and the special relationship between Hong Kong and China.
First, Tsui points out Hong Kong law enforcements can enquire a service provider for metadata of an individual for investigative purposes. Metadata refers to the data that describes other data. Service providers, who do not have specific baselines on which they cannot reveal user data, can share them under law enforcement request. Once the data is collected, it is unclear how it will be used against the people, in this case, the protesters.
Tsui adds that the barrier is very low in accessing data for law enforcers because they do not necessarily need a search warrant to request for relevant information for investigative purposes.
Apart from unclear rules, the extent to which Hong Kong law enforcement shares data with Chinese law enforcement is obscure. Tsui explains: “Hong Kong and Beijing are two different legal jurisdictions that are not subject to mutual legal assistance treaty, an agreement between two countries on what conditions you give data people and how they share the data.”
Law enforcement agencies can also seek help from companies offering device-unlocking services and software to access or copy private data on locked smartphones, whether it runs Android or IOS, according to Charles Mok, a legislative councillor of the Information Technology constituency. These circumstances collectively make people more alert to their privacy and information.
Meanwhile, on October 4, the Hong Kong government implemented the anti-mask law under the Emergency Regulation Ordinance as an attempt to stop violence on the streets.
The new law forbids people wearing masks at demonstrations. It authorises the police to ask people to remove their masks at protests, helping them identify the people at public gatherings, irrespective of its legality. If a person is found to have violated, the offender is subject to one-year imprisonment and a fine of HKD 25,000. With the anti-mask law enforced, over 77 have been arrested within three days of enactment, while concerns over identity protection persist as protesters continue to flood the streets.
Edited by Johanna Chan
Mainland students who study outside the Great Firewall of China have different news consumption habits, which influence their views on Hong Kong protests.
By Regina Chen
We are what we eat. We are what we read. Access to information, especially when Hong Kong is caught in political turmoil, is more important than ever before. As the movement sparked by the anti-extradition bill continues, news consumers are hooked to screens for information about protests on the front line.
When most assume that Mainlanders who mostly take Chinese social media platforms such as WeChat and Weibo, where politically sensitive topics are heavily censored, as news sources probably take a stand against the ongoing movement in Hong Kong, there are actually many who try to read news beyond the Great Firewall of China.
The Great Firewall of China is a surveillance and censorship system with the aim of ensuring discussions on China’s Internet are all topics approved by the Chinese government.
Varsity interviewed some mainland students who are currently studying in Hong Kong or abroad to learn about their news consuming habits. All of them decline to reveal their full names for fear of getting into trouble when they go back to Mainland China.
Different news media tell different stories
Chloe, a mainland student who is currently studying in Hong Kong, says some Mainlanders, especially those who have higher education levels and can bypass the firewall, are trying to gather more information to read before making judgments.
Chloe says when the protest started in June, many mainland students in Hong Kong were actually quite supportive of the movement. They also shared the news from different sources about the protests with their friends.
“These Mainlanders think they have the responsibility to spread verified information [about what is happening in Hong Kong],” says Chloe. “I also have many friends living in China who are familiar with this city and try to tell other people about the movement.”
Though many no longer support the movement due to escalating violent clashes, they are aware that different news sources are feeding news consumers very different stories.
Chloe says she is in the habit of reading news on Weibo and some bloggers on this social media site post information they gather outside the firewall. “But they have to bear a risk for having their accounts deleted,” she adds.
Mainland students who are studying abroad are also aware of different news narratives on different news platforms they browse. David is now studying in Canada, and he thinks it is important to acquire information from different sources. He cites a video about a man who was proved to be a reporter of the Chinese state media Global Times being beaten by protesters at the Hong Kong International Airport as one example.
“The same image or the same video may be interpreted differently by different media outlets in different countries,” says David. “The video went viral among Mainlanders and they think the protesters are pro-independence rioters and the movement has disrupted people’s daily life. That made the viewers think it was unreasonable for Hong Kong people to ask for their five demands.”
The five demands, Hong Kong people have asked for, include: an independent commission of inquiry, full withdrawn of the extradition bill, retraction of the characterization of protesters as ‘rioters’, amnesty for arrested protesters and dual universal suffrage, meaning for both the Legislative Council and the Chief Executive.
Narratives manipulated by politics
David started to have a negative attitude towards the Hong Kong movement after the protesters occupied the Hong Kong International Airport on August 12th, as he thinks the movement has affected other people and caused inconvenience and chaos. But he admits that it is hard to be objective in judging the movement.
David follows official accounts of international media outlets such as the New York Times, the Columbia Broadcasting System, and the British Broadcasting Corporation on Instagram. He prefers reading news stories produced by foreign news media outlets. “I believe in them more, because I think they can report news from a more objective angle,” he says.
He also reads news reports by Hong Kong media outlet, such as Apple Daily as well as those articles posted on Weibo and WeChat official accounts. “But I tend to avoid reading news produced by Chinese media outlets. Since the media in China is controlled by the party, you cannot learn about the movement in Hong Kong with an objective perspective [by reading their stories],” he says.
Another Mainlander Jacque shares David’s view on the Chinese news media. Having lived in Hong Kong for four years, he thinks Chinese official media outlets tend to be biased in their reporting.
“From their posts on Weibo or WeChat, I can sense that they tend to stir up readers’ emotions,” he says. But he still thinks news reports by these Chinese official media outlets are worth reading. “You can understand the party’s attitude towards certain incidents by reading these news stories,” he says, adding that he also reads news from Weibo and WeChat official accounts.
Sina Weibo, one of China’s most popular microblogging platforms, is widely used as news sources by Mainlanders.
Though many Mainlanders try to surmount the firewall for more access to information and the news, Jacque thinks that does not mean they will change their attitude toward the movement in Hong Kong or make them become more supportive of the protesters.
He attributes it to two main reasons. “First, they have a strong belief and faith in the party’s policies and rules. The other reason is about the development of computer algorithm. For example, if the first account that you follow on Facebook is the overseas edition of the People’s Daily, the recommendation system will forward you more information from those media outlets sharing similar political stances,” he says.
The People’s Daily is the official news outlet of the Communist Party in China, and it provides direct information on the viewpoints of the party.
Jacque thinks that in the long run, the Mainlanders who mostly consume news by China’s news outlets, the perspective of the information they get will be more and more limited.
Be alert when consuming the news
Grace Leung Lai-kuen, a lecturer at the School of Journalism and Communication at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says it is normal for the people living in the Mainland to have their own perception of Hong Kong. “The perception may be shaped by the country, by the previous experience, or by the education,” she says. “If they have their own values, they will impose their values while viewing those issues.”
Leung thinks that when people try to get the news, they will filter the information through their own ideology and political preferences to confirm their existing knowledge. She says no one will see things from a neutral stance. “If the information is close to their values and shares similar ideas, then they tend to accept it,” she adds. To be aware of the authenticity of information, Leung encourages people to keep a sceptical mind when reading news.
By Gloria Li and Jasmine Ling
