Mimi fried marks

This article is to record the process of my fight with WeChat in the recent wave of bombing. Because I tried to search for other people's stories after bombing, it made me realize that even if I didn't find a solution, it's comforting to see words written by people with similar experiences.

Another reason is because I read Yan Lianke's article "Through This Epidemic, Let's Become People with Memory" on Duan Media in the past two days. The author earnestly urged writers not to give up writing their own personal memories and feelings, and put the I am quite shocked that the public opinion field is given to those who always recite grand narratives in a pure lyrical tone. I seriously reflected on my own inaction because of laziness and cowardice and gave up writing more articles, and I also re-established a foundation for what I understood as public writing—witnessing history with individuals. Standing on this foundation, I see my own responsibility, not an inflated (or atrophied) ego, to be self-sufficient in a public space. This means that I will no longer rely solely on my own interests to do things, but when the ego becomes weak, there is still a transcendent force that drives me to cheer up.

So, I should write about my experience of being banned for speaking out during this pandemic. In essence, we are all Li Wenliang's fellow travelers. He was pushed to the forefront, but more of a group of people who are seriously lacking in statistical data and research texts. The same content is severely censored, making it difficult to present and disseminate.

Regarding the context of this bombing, please refer to my last article "Our Loss Must Be Irretrievable | Commemorating Li Wenliang", and I will not repeat it here. This article focuses on what I did after the bombing, what I encountered, and what I learned.

My WeChat account has been used for more than eight years and has accumulated nearly 5,000 contacts, so after being suddenly permanently banned, the loss is huge. Seeing someone on the Internet sneering at people who use WeChat, something like "I know this thing sucks and continue to use it, doesn't it deserve it?" I want to say that the biggest problem is obviously the wall, so why blame the victim? I was physically outside the wall, and going to WeChat felt like a "prison visit", but for more people in "prison", it was not so easy to escape physically and psychologically. Because it's not just the software itself that determines what social software people use, but where people's social connections are. The ever-higher wall and the huge complex functions of WeChat (collective communication, social networking, payment, games, content production...) have monopolized the lives of most Chinese people (other domestic social media platforms also follow the censorship mechanism, and more It’s the misery that formed this local area network ecology), and “controlling the majority of people” has always been the utility of censorship and stability maintenance, and it is difficult for individuals to control in a short period of time.

Reminds the Iranian actress Taraneh Alidoosti once said after the Iranian authorities admitted to shooting down the passenger plane: "We are not the people, we are all hostages, millions of hostages."

And how many millions of Chinese are being kidnapped by the wall and WeChat?

It was around the night of February 4th when I found myself being forced to log out of WeChat. After logging in again, I saw the prompt that I was permanently banned. The reason was "spreading malicious rumors and other illegal content." At this time, WeChat provided me with the permission to log in temporarily, allowing me to transfer the money in the WeChat wallet.

After I logged in, I found that the sending and receiving of messages and the circle of friends were restricted, and I could not communicate with anyone, but I could still see the update of the group information and the update of the circle of friends of my friends. It's like the soul that came out of the body after his death is looking at the world. I've tried several messages to no avail. At that time, the whole person was a little anxious, so I quickly transferred all the more than 1,000 yuan in my wallet (later I found out that it is better not to transfer all of them, and keep a few yuan in the wallet for subsequent login), and then open WhatsApp and Telegram one by one. , Signal, and some close friends talked about the bombed account, and started to register a new account.

The account was bombed mainly because I forwarded sensitive articles to my own group, and both my group and another administrator’s account were bombed at the same time. Fortunately, when the group was established, a friend created a group on Tele at the same time. Most of the group members were backed up outside the wall, which allowed me to get in touch with them in the first place. Then everyone initiates location sharing in the bombed group to remind each other that the group has been bombed.

(After the group was bombed, it was difficult for many members to notice, because everyone could speak normally, but they could not see each other’s speech and would not receive a response. WeChat treats overseas users and domestic users differently, so it often happens that overseas users can The bombed group communicates with each other, but domestic users cannot see their information. But "location sharing" can be seen by all members, so once you find that someone in the group initiates location sharing for no reason, it is very likely that this group It's already blown up, or the person's account has blown up.)

I used the US mobile number bound to the original number that was bombed to apply for a new number. When I applied, WeChat asked that this mobile number was already bound to another number. Do you want to continue? As soon as my brain became hot, I chose to continue, and then this phone number was automatically unbound from the original number that was bombed.

During the application process, I need a third party to help me with auxiliary verification, that is, I need to find another friend who uses WeChat to scan the code for me to open an account (this is not everyone who is qualified to scan, if it is a registered user in mainland China, it must be registered The time is more than six months, if it is a local user, it must have been registered for more than one month), I sent the QR code to a friend, and it was successfully opened soon.

Then I distributed the new account and added more than 300 friends overnight. After that, people kept reminding me that my account was abnormal. The next morning, the account was permanently banned again, because " There are violations such as harassment/malicious marketing/fraud”.

I judged that it should be caused by using the mobile phone number bound to the bombed number, so I changed the domestic mobile phone number that I used when I returned to China and applied again (the only mobile phone number I had at hand at the time), and I also asked a friend for help after I left. The verification process, and then the new WeChat ID was sent out. Everyone's response was: "Why did you blow up again?" But unfortunately, within 20 minutes, WeChat forced me to log out again, reminding me This account was banned for the same reason as the previous one.

After I was full of WTF, I stopped the urge to restore the account as soon as possible, and calmly thought about why this is all. The strongest feeling is that I have been designated - the WeChat censorship (or the Internet police) must be because they know my identity, so they continue to bomb my account, and it is getting faster and faster.

But there are also friends who have been bombed many times, saying that it is easy to be bombarded in a hurry after the bombing, and it will be fine after a while. And the new account cannot be added too quickly, otherwise it is easy to trigger an exception.

But no matter what, the intensity of WeChat’s almost frenzied bans in those days was definitely not a daily level.

I consulted a professional and technical person again. The other party's suggestion is to change the mobile phone number and use a new mobile phone. It is better to buy a sim card that does not need to be bound with identity information (it is easy in the United States), and try to avoid being identified. Identity operations.

Due to this wave of consecutive bans, I was a little frustrated by the hammer, so I bought an anonymous sim card online. I didn't use WeChat while waiting for it to be sent to my home. Instead, I got some free time for self-cultivation and found that I didn't send WeChat. I still live a good life, but without the circle of friends, I still can’t function.

What moved me was that a friend immediately set up a "rescue group" on WeChat after learning that I had been bombed continuously, and spent a lot of time retrieving all my friends from the bombed group. It reduces the workload of my subsequent additions.

Then another friend lent me a WeChat account he registered in Hong Kong for temporary use, with his bank card tied to that account. We have never met, and this is a great trust.

Fortunately, I always have a new unopened mobile phone, so I used this mobile phone to log in to the account he lent me (after he cooperated with me to send the mobile phone verification code), and finally I was able to use WeChat normally.

I'm a bit dumbfounded, I just want to communicate on a daily basis, why should I become a special agent? But since they've all become secret agents, it's not worth it if they don't rush to a tower.

I have also tried to complain after reading some experiences of being hacked online. First, I directly searched the customer service number of Tencent WeChat and called it. All of them were answered automatically, and I could not contact the manual service. Then I followed the "Consult Customer Service" link provided at the bottom of the notification page of being banned, and applied for a review of the account in a limited number of options. This operation also requires a third-party WeChat account to scan the code for verification, so I scanned it directly with the borrowed WeChat account, and then I needed to fill in the application content in this WeChat account. The number of characters was limited, which didn’t give me much use. .

I even saw Tencent customer service reminding the applicant to review: "Once the customer service finds that the violation is serious, it may impose a heavier penalty on the account, please be aware!"

I can fuck eighteen generations of your ancestors.

About two days later, the review result was sent to the WeChat account I borrowed. There was only a short sentence, to the effect that the permanent ban would not be unblocked.

We've been treated so arrogantly all the time that we can't do anything about it. Recalling the Huawei 251 incident, I also complained that companies in this land have also learned the bad habits of the authorities, and they have all become mafia.

I don't dare to add more people to the borrowed account, after all, I have to pay it back. During the long years of waiting for the new sim card, I tried to log in to the three bombed numbers several times, and found that the last number can be unblocked, as long as the real-name authentication is carried out, that is, the domestic bank card is bound.

So I just tried it: Binding a bank savings card requires verification of the card owner's reserved mobile phone number in the bank, and I have been away from China for several years, and the reserved mobile phone number has long since changed, so I called the bank and asked, Said it had to be done at the counter. Then I changed the credit card binding of another domestic bank, called the domestic credit card center, and successfully changed the reserved phone number, saying that it will take effect in 24 hours. I waited 24 hours before going to bind, thinking that this will work, right?

As a result, WeChat told me that this credit card is a foreign currency card and does not support binding.

I also tried to ask my mother if she could help me buy a new sim card in China, and then use her identity to register a WeChat account for me to use. She replied: During the epidemic, the door could not go out, and the business hall was not open. place to buy.

Also added: "It's good for you to keep your mouth shut." Mother? ? ?

I can't wait until the slow delivery in the US finally delivered my new sim card. Because I wanted to be anonymous and I didn’t want to pay the monthly package fee, the card I bought was not from a common service provider, so I needed to register and activate it online. I didn’t expect to be required to bind a bank card after registration, so I thought about binding it to the United States. There should be no problem with the card, so it is not even possible to review this information on WeChat, right? As a result, I tried several times, and the bank card binding failed, and I don't know why.

So far, it's not just the censorship mechanism of the wall country that has ravaged me, but the whole damn modern society. It's unbelievable that in this brave new world built everywhere in the name of convenience and speed, I would be cornered on such a small thing? Or is cornering the reality, and convenience is just an illusion that imprisons us? The Internet has long since died, in this endless binding, verification, real-name authentication, and trick censorship.

I, who was on the verge of collapse, got into the horns of the horns that were smashed to the end. I searched for a nearby mobile phone operator's store, walked in and applied for a pay as you go card, installed it on my new mobile phone, and started to register for a new WeChat account.

Of course, I encountered the level that requires third-party WeChat account verification. I sent the verified QR code to at least four friends, and tried again and again. Some of them have WeChat accounts registered in mainland China, and some have Canadian and American accounts. And they all meet the verification qualifications written on WeChat. However, after WeChat jumped out of the page and asked them to fill in their real name and ID number, they told them that they were not qualified to verify for me.

The friend was so angry: "Why am I not qualified? You asked me for my real name and ID card and told me that I was not qualified?"

So even if I use a new mobile phone and a new sim card, I am still unable to register a new WeChat account because of this verification.

I thought I would never be able to use WeChat, but I soon discovered that there was one last method left, which was to buy a WeChat account directly from a scalper.

I felt like I was being forced into prostitution on the spot.

Taobao has been cleaned up a long time ago, and no keywords can be found. I tried to google the website directly, and sure enough, I found some sites that sell accounts, but the biggest problem is that you can't determine whether they are scammers or not.

The dead horse became a living horse doctor. I thought that I was only deceived for a few dozen yuan, so I contacted a QQ account on the web page and chose a WeChat account registered abroad. After Alipay passed a few dozen yuan, the other party boy The old man gave me a number and assisted me in mobile phone verification. I successfully logged in, changed the password and bound mobile number.

After using it for a few days, I dared to slowly add people and advertise my new account. A friend said: I have a lot of you here, and I replied: I can already put together a table of mahjong.

But as more and more people added, friends began to remind me that my account was abnormal. I did some research and found that the account I bought was registered in Malaysia, and the account in Malaysia also has the option of binding a bank card (the U.S. The account number does not have this option), and can only be bound to a local card in Malaysia, which means that I cannot perform real-name authentication by binding a bank card, so if WeChat is a mandatory real-name authentication for users in Malaysia In terms of sex, this account may still be blocked at some point.

The question is, why does WeChat enforce real-name authentication for users in Malaysia? Does this reflect from the side that China's penetration into Southeast Asia has reached a certain level?

After the bombing, many people took the initiative to find me and express their condolences. Thank you. A few friends who shared the same illness also shared their experiences. Some people finally recovered their permanently banned accounts after three months of unremitting complaints, but some people insisted on complaining in exchange for their accounts being cancelled. There is also a rumored case that borrowing a few hundred yuan from WeChat micro-loans and repaying it in installments can prevent the account from blowing up. Many people forwarded it to me, but soon a friend said that he still had 40,000 yuan to pay, but he was permanently banned. . It feels that there is no fixed standard at all, it all depends on personal creation.

Someone on the Internet said that this is called "unknown punishment, unpredictable power". Others say that censorship works because it has boundaries, and when it loses boundaries, it means that everything we say is wrong, and the fear of censorship disappears.

I submitted a complaint again, stating that if I could not get my account back, I would submit the evidence to lawyers and related organizations in the United States, and resolutely pursue the legal responsibility of Tencent. I don't know if the threat has taken effect. Yesterday, I logged in to the bombed account again - although it still hasn't been unblocked - but I found that I have new permissions and can export all the data on the account, including the address book and Moments, just wait for the WeChat email after submitting the export application.

I decided to wait for the data to continue to complain.

Later, another friend who had just been bombed told me a trick. If you change the bound mobile phone number to a European mobile phone number (or register directly with a European mobile phone number), you will get the option of "export data". Settings - Account & Security - More Security Settings" page. This is because WeChat operating in Europe must comply with the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) Act, which allows users to export their own data.

I tried to spend a few dollars to register a Belgian mobile phone number with Dingdong, and then changed my new WeChat account to this number. After waiting for a few minutes, the option to export data appeared. As of this writing, this method is still valid, so this should reduce the cost of bombing.

In recent years, it has become the norm for domestic Internet companies to use the system of "distinguishing between inside and outside". They cooperate with the authorities to play hooliganism internally, but they have to obey the supervision and restraint of the laws of other countries outside. This gives us some space to move around. It's not something to celebrate at all.

It's been over half a month since I was able to (temporarily) use WeChat, and it's incredible how much friction it has caused me. Losing contacts and losing a lot of life records is just the beginning, and the time and energy consumption that follows is simply exhausting. More traumatic experiences come from the humiliation that the arrogant power in general does whatever it wants without paying any price, so that more people have to invest their precious lives in this absurd procedure over and over again.

I couldn't bear to have this meaningless experience in my life and let it keep eroding my strength, so I had to write it down as a counterattack.

During the whole process, I also saw more people fighting back, from the "Wechat Envelope Account" super chat, to the launch of two "I want freedom of speech" and "I want freedom of speech" social media campaigns - there is one It is said that girls from Shanghai took to the streets to hold placards, and several scholars and civic groups launched a joint signature campaign for freedom of speech. And this has also triggered overseas linkages. I have seen reporters from foreign media conducting investigations on WeChat accounts during the epidemic, and Citizen Power has also launched a class action lawsuit against Tencent.

The counterattack may attract more suppression. Isn’t this bombing the result of my long-standing challenge to the boundaries of speech again and again? But the suppression will also brew the next counterattack. The noose is not tightened all at once. If the boundaries of speech cannot be widened, at least we let it meet a little more resistance when it is tightened, and then a little more.