By Calum MacLeod, USA TODAY
BEIJING — Vigilant Internet users spotted news photos of a housing official and posted heated online discussions about his $15,000 Swiss watch and $22-a-pack cigarettes.
Two weeks later, Zhou Juigeng in Nanjing was fired. He is under investigation for an apparent "lavish lifestyle" that exceeds his government salary, according to the state-run China Daily.
The case illustrates how China's Internet users, operating in groups, can go after people they think have done something wrong by putting information about them online and allowing others to join in the harassment.
The phenomenon, in a country that heavily censors the Internet, has an unusual name — "human flesh search engine" — a Chinese phrase describing how individuals are hunted down and exposed on the Web.
"The frequency and variety of human flesh searches really flowered (last year), ranging from exposure of misbehaving children and corrupt officials to the nationalistic chasing down of people connected to the Tibetan riots," says Jeremy Goldkorn, founder of Danwei.org, a website focused on China's media.
"The searches can reveal corruption and corporate malfeasance, and issues that should be aired in an open society," he says. "But it is by nature a sensationalist phenomenon that can invade people's privacy."
China has more Internet users than any other nation: more than 250 million. These searches provide a form of grass-roots democracy in a communist country that tightly controls the news and public debate.
The Chinese government blocks access to many websites it considers subversive or too political. This week, the government launched a one-month campaign to delete vulgar and pornographic content from China's websites — but the power of human flesh searches is recognized.
People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, posted a list from Internet user Lan Feng of the top nine cases of corrupt officials overthrown by the Internet in 2008. Recent articles by the state-run Xinhua News Agency herald the new cyberpower: "Chinese netizens flex their muscles in 2008," and "Free voices on Internet new path to democracy in China."
Typical human flesh searches on Mop.com, a popular Chinese website, included a hunt for the identity of a pretty woman photographed on a Guangzhou bus and for a stall owner at Changsha railway station accused of bilking rail users of their change.
Six officials in Hengyang in Hunan province who were asleep during a speech commemorating China's 30th anniversary of economic changes last month were fired after people raised a ruckus online, Xinhua says.
Some searches turn ugly fast.
Wang Fei, a former employee of the Beijing office of advertiser Saatchi & Saatchi, won China's first court case last month against a human flesh search engine.
He was the target of harassment and death threats — including some painted on his parents' door — because his wife committed suicide after learning he had an affair. His wife's diary describing her pain was later posted online.
Wang sued an individual and a website that led the cybermanhunt reviling him and won $1,400. Justice "has been done with this result," says Wang's lawyer, Zhang Yanfeng.
The court decision could force Internet providers "to pay more attention to improper comments by their users," Zhang says. "You cannot violate other people's right to privacy and right of reputation."
Liu Renwen, a law professor at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, says new laws are needed.
"The level of privacy protection shows the development of a civilized society in any country," he says, "but ethics on the Internet have yet to be established in China."
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