China Shut Down over 60,000 'Lewd' Websites in 2010

China has the world's largest internet population, but the authorities are not giving up on their idea of controlling the web. And it seems to be working, at least according to the statistics the government itself released. The State Council Information Office managed to shut down 60,000 websites with 'adult content,' leading to the arrest of almost 5,000 people.

That's not all, the office in charge of cleaning up the digital landscape also boasts that 1.79 million websites were scrubbed of any 'objectionable' material, including articles, photos and videos, deleting some 350 million pieces of content in the process.

China's fight against 'adult content' threatening to adversely affect the mental health of the country's youth sometimes goes beyond its intended purpose as the country makes sure to remove and block access to any political or otherwise sensitive material, under the cloak of protecting the children.

Several large foreign sites are blocked outright in the country, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and so on, but web traffic in its entirety is scrubbed. When it comes to local websites, the government has the power to remove anything it finds objectionable.

However, according to the same official sources, China is also making some headway in combating piracy which has been rampant in the country. About 44.37 million copies of "illegal publications" were confiscated in the past year.

Of these, 37.35 million were pirated copies, 3.93 million were "illegal copies" of newspapers and magazines, and only 981,000 copies of what the government deemed "lewd" content.

The authorities have destroyed a total of 36.39 million copies of pirated or illegal content in various forms. Of course, while the numbers seem impressive, they're useless without context and the number of pirated copies sold in China in the past year should be significantly higher than whatever the authorities confiscated.