Hong Kong's future national security law will not allow the blocking of social networks, the territory's justice minister assured on Wednesday after a public consultation that suggested a possible ban on certain applications.
“I can say with certainty that we have absolutely no intention of banning social media,” Minister Paul Lam told a meeting of the city’s Legislative Council.
“The aim is to misuse or misuse these tools to disseminate comments that could endanger national security (…). We are not targeting social networks as such,” he continued.
The minister was speaking after releasing the results of a month-long public consultation in Hong Kong on the future national security law, which will complement the law imposed by Beijing in 2020 following major pro-democracy demonstrations in 2019.
According to these findings, some respondents believed that “sites such as Facebook and YouTube should be removed from the Hong Kong market” or that Telegram and Signal messaging services were “hotbeds of crime” that needed to be banned.
Several platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and X are blocked for regular users in mainland China but remain accessible in Hong Kong.
The Hong Kong government is expected to present its draft law next week, which will criminalize new offenses such as treason, sedition and espionage, in addition to those provided for in the 2020 text. The latter was imposed directly on the territory of Beijing in 2020 by the central government and has made virtually any form of dissent or protest in the city illegal.
Journalist associations, human rights organizations, foreign companies and diplomats fear that the new law will further restrict freedom of expression.
Since the 2020 law, foreign tech giants like Google and Meta have been walking a tightrope in Hong Kong. Some are rejecting requests from the Hong Kong government to remove content.
Authorities seeking to legally ban the 2019 protest anthem, “Glory to Hong Kong,” have notably called on YouTube and Google to remove it from search results.