``Blank paper'' is used to avoid censorship in large-scale protests in China, is Apple's AirDrop restriction limited to China also affected?



In China, the ``zero corona policy'' continues even in article creation, and a certain period of blockade (lockdown) is being implemented in areas where the infection of the new coronavirus has been confirmed. People who are dissatisfied with this zero-corona policy are holding large-scale protests in various parts of China, which are said to be ``since the Tiananmen Incident,'' but in the protests, ``papers with opinions and demands'' There are a lot of 'blank papers with nothing written on them'.

New Symbol of Protest in China Rolls Censors: Blank White Papers - WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-symbol-of-protest-in-china-roils-censors-blank-white-papers-11669642676

When a fire broke out in a housing complex in the Uighur Autonomous Region in November 2022, multiple residents who were believed to have failed to escape due to the lockdown due to the strict zero-corona policy died. Triggered by this incident, calls for a review of the zero-corona policy have rapidly expanded in China, leading to large-scale protests against the government in various parts of China, such as Beijing and Shanghai.

Many photos and videos of the protests have been posted online. In general, demonstrations and protests put up papers and signs that write down the claims, but it has become a hot topic that ``blank paper'' is raised in protests in China.

Below is a picture of a protest participant holding a blank page. Some hold up a blank piece of paper like A4 copy paper, while others hold up white masks or cloth.




A video of the protest at Tsinghua University also shows many people raising a blank sheet of paper and raising their voices. According to the BBC's China correspondent Stephen McDonnell, holding up a blank page meant a challenge to regulators: 'Are you going to arrest me for just holding up a blank piece of paper?' is also included.




In addition, Mr. Liza Lin, a China correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, said that even if you search for the word 'blank paper' on China's large-scale SNS 'WeChat', content related to protests will not be displayed. Services such as 'Zhihu' have reported that search results related to 'blank paper' have been deleted entirely.




As mentioned above, postings on the Internet are strictly censored in China, making it difficult to share protest intentions via the Internet. For this reason, in China, the short-range wireless communication function 'AirDrop' installed in Apple products such as the iPhone was widely used as a means of sharing information without going through the Internet. However, in iOS16.1.1 released on November 9, 2022, a 10-minute time limit was set only in China for ``the function that can receive AirDrop from anyone''. It has been pointed out that this change may have made it more difficult to share information about protests in China.




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