Censorship after death: Chinese netizens quietly mourn Liu Xiaobo

After Liu's death, information and images released to the public have been very carefully selected

The ashes of the late Chinese democracy advocate and literary critic Liu Xiaobo were buried at sea near Dalian city in northeast China on July 15, two days after he died of liver failure.

In interviews with Hong Kong television outlets, Liu’s brother, Liu Xiaoguang, expressed “great thanks and appreciation to the Chinese Communist party” for Liu Xiaobo’s cancer treatment and funeral arrangement.

But Liu Xiaobo's supporters believe that the he was buried at sea to prevent people in China from paying tribute to the Nobel laureate at his grave.

In fact, most of Liu’s friends could not attend the funeral. While his wife, Liu Xia, had appeared on photos of his funeral and sea burial, she has lost touch with her friends.

Liu Xiaobo had been sentenced to 11 years in prison in 2009 for “inciting subversion of state power” for his involvement in Charter 08, a manifesto that called for democratic reforms in China. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 for his human rights work.

On social media, including Weibo and WeChat, researchers documented a significant increase in censorship after Liu Xiaobo’s death. According to Toronto-based digital rights research group Citizen Lab, discussions of Liu and his work are no longer tolerated.

On Facebook, Hong Kong academic and Citizen Lab researcher Lokman Tsui summarized the group's findings:

For WeChat, before his death, discussion of Liu was allowed as long as it did not touch on certain sensitive topics such as “Charter 08” or his medical care. After his death, any mention of his name in English and Chinese (both simplified and traditional) is enough to get messages blocked. His death is also the first time we see image filtering in one-to-one chat, in addition to image filtering in group chats and WeChat Moments [which is equivalent to Facebook's news feed].

For Sina Weibo, there already was a ban on searches for Liu’s name in English and Chinese (both simplified and traditional). However, after his death, his given name (Xiaobo) alone is enough to trigger censorship, showing increased censorship on the platform and a recognition that his passing is a particularly sensitive event. Nevertheless, there is also evidence suggesting there continues to be genuine user interest in producing and finding Liu-related content using alternative keywords.

For the first time, image-sharing was blocked in one-on-one chat. Left: A Canadian user sends a picture of a politically symbolic chair image to a friend in China. Right: The recipient does not see the chair. Screenshots by Citizen Lab.