Chinese authorities are seeking greater control of the country’s estimated 140,000 plus internet cafes. One proposal under consideration enviages a total ban on these cafes on the plea that they have become breeding grounds for social problems.

Only last month (Feb 2010) China announced plans to tighten controls on website owners, demanding that they  disclose their real identities when registering sites.

The latest move has invited the wrath of hackers who have targetted the web site of Yan Qi, who has come up with the suggestion for consideration of country’s parliament. This influential business woman from the southern city of Chongqing  holds the view that the Internet Cafes are responsible for growing addiction to video games, pornography and trauncy.

Yan, a  member of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference  (CPPCC), owns the Taoranju hot pot restaurant chain.

With in hours of making her proposal, the home page of her company’s web site  was hacked and  derisory messages were plastered, there by putting Beijing on notice that even without democracy in the country, people have ways of making their voice heard.
 
‘Desperate diseases must have drastic cures, which is to ban them all’, Yan Qi is quoted as saying in justification of her proposal. But polls showed that 70 per cent of internet users are opposed to the ban.

The 2,374 member -strong CPPCC is an advisory body attached to Parliament, the National People’s Congress, but has no real power.