The Chinese government gives us a small reminder of what it's like to live under "Big Brother"

With everyone blowing the US paying Iraqi newspapers to print positive stories, we forget what true state sponsored censorship really is. Here's just a small glimpse into Communist China Dec. 6 (Bloomberg) -- China's government said it stepped up monitoring of short messages sent between the nation's 383 million mobile-phone users to prevent fraudsters, pornographers and other "unhealthy elements'' from exploiting the technology. Police found 107,000 illegal short messages and shut down 9,700 cell-phone accounts since the start of November, Wu Heping, vice minister of the Ministry of Public Security, said at a briefing in Beijing today that was broadcast on the Internet. China is using filtering software to combat a proliferation of scams encouraged by a text-message market that's growing at more than 50 percent a year. The government is also using the technology to control news and information, according to Reporters Without Borders, a Paris-based advocacy group. Aside from using it to prevent fraud and porn and gambling, what else might they use this for? China has 2,800 surveillance centers that monitor text message traffic for political comments as well as illegal activities, the group said in a July 2004 report that cited a press release by Beijing-based Venus Info Tech Ltd. Venus Info Tech received permission from the public security ministry to market a surveillance system that allows authorities to filter messages for "false political rumors'' and "reactionary remarks,'' the Paris-based group said. The system generates automatic alerts to police and saves information about suspect texts for 60 days, it said. The crackdown on short-message services mirrors a tightening of rules on Internet content announced in September. Under the rules, Web sites that post materials that "threaten national security'' can be fined, the official Xinhua news agency said. You you guys thought the Patriot Act was bad... It's just another reason to be thankful we live in the freedom we do.