Beijing, July 12: Social networking sites like Facebook pose a security threat to China and are used as “tools of subversion” by Western nations including the US, a top Chinese think tank said in a report this week.
Ethnic riots in China’s western-most Xinjiang region last year were spurred on by such micro-blogging sites, the state-run China Academy of Social Sciences (Cass) said in its annual report on the development of new media.
“Facebook has appeared as the rallying point for overseas Xinjiang separatist groups,” the report said.
“These social networking sites have become a tool of political subversion used by Western nations, including the United States.”
Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are blocked in China.
—Agencies