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China has blocked Wikipedia in every language

China blocks Wikipedia in every language. (Photos: Getty)
China blocks Wikipedia in every language. (Photos: Getty)

It’s well-known you won’t be able to access the Google suite or any of your favourite social media platforms if you’re in China, among an exhaustive list of other sites about news, human rights, or porn.

Now, another top website has been added to the list: Wikipedia.

According to the Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI), the Chinese language version of Wikipedia at zh.wikpedia.org has been blocked for a while, but the censor has now been expanded to include all editions ending in .wikipedia.org.

OONI data reveals other language editions of Wikipedia have been available in China up until April.

All Wikipedia domains have been blocked since April 2019.
(Source: OONI)

According to a BBC report, Wikimedia received “no notice” of the block.

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"In late April, the Wikimedia Foundation determined that Wikipedia was no longer accessible in China,” Wikimedia said.

“After closely analysing our internal traffic reports, we can confirm that Wikipedia is currently blocked across all language versions."

Having earned the nickname of the ‘Great Firewall of China’, China has blocked more than 10,000 domain names as of September 2018, including more than a fifth of the world’s most-visited websites, according to Alexa.

You won’t be able to read ABC News in China, nor the Taiwanese, Hong Kong or Japanese editions of Yahoo.

Where else is Wikipedia blocked?

China’s not the only country to ban the community-edited online encyclopaedia: the site is banned to varying extents in Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Pakistan, Russia, Thailand, Turkey, Tunisia, Uzbekistan and Venezuela, according to a Wikipedia page on the matter.

It should be noted, however, that in most of these countries, Wikipedia has only been banned partially, or in relation to sexually or politically sensitive topics.

Western countries such as France and the United Kingdom also have a history of banning Wikipedia, though these pertained to child pornography or political content.

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