This is such a disgrace. Naomi Wu is one of the most interesting personalities out there. Absurdly enough, she was always very careful to not paint China in a negative light. She also managed to show everyday life and culture in China from an inside perspective, which is rare enough. It's a real shame and a huge loss to the maker community. Let's hope this gets some publicity, which may help protect her.
The problem was that after Vice published her info, she basically lost any protection she had. Also how no foreign press is really saying anything or asking about her. She was protected when China thought the world was watching her; now that they know they’re not, she’s been silenced.
Her girlfriend is also Uighur, which had her in another precarious situation. She’s said she can’t leave China because her girlfriend can’t.
she was always very careful to not paint China in a negative light.
A few times she even called out Chinese companies that were acting scummy to foreign customers and asked that they act better to not damage China's reputation.
(I'm sure that language ws specifically chosen to have maximum impact for someone who understood they might face very real consequences over damaging China's image)
That visit to the UMIDIGI office for GPL compliance was 👌
Ben commented:
Hi,
You can request the shareable source codes (most of them are not free and owned by MediaTek) at our Shenzhen office (only Chinese speaking) in working hours.
The address is:
405-407 Jinqi Zhigu Building , 4/F , 1 Tangling Road , Nanshan District , Shenzhen City, P.R.C
Can you elaborate? To me it reads like she outed herself by going against tencent, or more probably/accurately, her government and one of its convenience spyware. She had already said for many years that she was under scrutiny, and her assumption was that her western followers would somehow compel the CCP to back off.
I'm not a hater, but for anyone paying attention that's ludicrous. With her knowledge, she couldn't be that naive.
Renowned Chinese maker Naomi Wu has been threatened and questioned by Chinese authorities, facing imprisonment if she continues posting openly online.
Wu has brought attention to privacy issues with popular third-party keyboards in China that could record keystrokes and send them to developers like Tencent.
Researchers recently confirmed this vulnerability in a report to Tencent, who were slow to address the problem.
Shortly after, Wu was detained and warned to limit her online discussions or face consequences.
Wu feels silenced and that Western audiences who once supported her have abandoned her.
The video creator blames Elon Musk for ruining Twitter and limiting their ability to stay connected to people like Wu.
Centralized social platforms play a role in protecting dissenting voices by giving them visibility and an audience.
Frequent disruptions to platforms force rebuilding connections and communities elsewhere.
Wu's outspoken views on technology and politics in China came with risks, which authorities are now cracking down on.
There are calls to raise more awareness of Wu's situation through media coverage and online sharing.
Give up. You could post an article by a Pulitzer Prize Winner and it wouldn't be good enough. Hell, I posted an English translation of a Chinese article about the arrest of a Chinese LGBT author and it wasn't good enough.