VoIP decision means Skype now illegal

Found on People's Daily Online on Wednesday, 29 December 2010
Browse Politics

The Chinese regulator has declared Internet phone services other than those provided by China Telecom and China Unicom as illegal, which is expected to make services like Skype unavailable in the country.

The ruling is designed to protect the state-owned carriers, a Xinhua report said.

It's less about protecting state-owned carriers, but more about easy wiretapping of calls. Chinese officials are control freaks, and having a VoIP service they cannot tap into is a threat to them.