Michael Forsythe

China has ordered several of the country’s most popular Internet portals to halt much of their original news reporting, in a move that could confine an even larger share of the journalism in the country to Communist-controlled mouthpieces ahead of an important party meeting in 2017. The profit-driven portals, several of which are listed on United States stock exchanges, have in recent years expanded their investigative teams to increase readership among China’s more than 600 million Internet users by scooping the staid state-owned news media on stories about subjects including industrial pollution, tainted milk powder and even police brutality.

But on July 25, several news organizations reported that the Beijing office of China’s Internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China, ordered the websites of a number of the companies, including Sina, Sohu, NetEase and Phoenix, to shut down or “clean up” several of their most popular online news features. The announcement came within weeks of the surprise departure of the Cyberspace Administration’s director, Lu Wei, and his replacement by an official who had served under President Xi Jinping in a previous position. Under Mr. Xi, media controls have tightened as the Communist Party has tried to squelch news that might put its governance in an unfavorable light.

China has ordered several of the country’s most popular internet portals to halt much of their original news reporting, in a move that could confine an even larger share of the journalism in the country to Communist-controlled mouthpieces ahead of an important party meeting in 2017.

The profit-driven portals, several of which are listed on United States stock exchanges, have in recent years expanded their investigative teams to increase readership among China’s more than 600 million internet users by scooping the staid state-owned news media on stories about subjects including industrial pollution, tainted milk powder and even police brutality. But on July 25, several news organizations reported that the Beijing office of China’s internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China, ordered the websites of a number of the companies, including Sina, Sohu, NetEase and Phoenix, to shut down or “clean up” several of their most popular online news features.

China introduced new restrictions on what the government has called “critical” news articles and barred Chinese journalists from doing work outside their beats or regions, putting further restraints on reporters in one of the world’s most controlled news media environments.

Reporters in China must now seek permission from their employers before undertaking “critical reports” and are barred from setting up their own websites, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television announced in new rules. The state agency said on its website that the rules came after a series of cases involving misconduct by journalists, including extortion.

But journalists and rights activists said the rules could have a chilling effect on reporting in China, a country already ranked 173rd out of 179 countries on the press freedom index published by Reporters Without Borders.