Women at a hair salon in China

If you are a frequent visitor to websites such as ifeng.com, Ku6.com, PPTV and Sina.com, be prepared for some changes as some of these websites’ popular programs were shut down by the country’s National Internet Information Office for deliberately providing “sensational and lewd content,” reported state news agency Xinhua on December 15.

Eight websites, including Aiqiyi.com and Sohu.com, were singled out by the Internet watchdog for posting large quantities of lewd photos and videos. It noted that, “their editing staff deliberately used such content to attract readers’ attention, with negative results.”

Seven programs listed on the eight websites were shut down, including a seemingly innocuous program called Boke or Blogger from ifeng. The sites in question were also ordered by local Internet bureaus in Beijing, Guangdong and Shanghai for a thorough cleaning up for their online content.

The move is a part of the “Clean Web 2014 Initiative”, which aims to clean out pornographic and lewd content online. Despite the efforts, some foreign pornographic websites managed to escape China’s censor and are decidedly available in mainland China. In fact, Chinese spent the second longest time browsing a Canadian pornographic website in 2014.

When eight websites are down, more Chinese are clicking through alternative foreign pornographic sites for gratification. So much for a Clean Web!

Photos: flickre (user dcmaster)