China's Impersonation And Misinformation Crackdown: 67K Accounts, 1.4M Posts Vanished
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) recently completed a two-month probe targeting social media activities, resulting in the deletion of over 1.4M posts and 67K accounts. The investigation focused on issues such as impersonation of government officials and the spread of misinformation. "Self-media" accounts, which are independent news and information sources not owned by the state, were particularly scrutinized, with popular apps like WeChat , Douyin , and Weibo being closely monitored. As part of the crackdown, the CAC specifically targeted fake military accounts (around 13K identified) and accounts impersonating public institutions (approximately 25K). Punishments were also meted out to 187K accounts for impersonating news media businesses and 430K accounts for providing professional advice or educational services without the necessary qualifications. This extensive social media cleanup campaign by the CAC follows similar actions in the past. Accoding to CAC ,