New Chinese law reinforces government control of cyberspace

BEIJING (AP) — China's legislature passed sweeping legislation on Wednesday that reinforces government controls over cyberspace, as the nation's leaders try to address what they see as growing threats to Chinese networks and national security.

China is also accused of running a state-sponsored effort to hack computers and steal government and commercial secrets overseas, while also spying on and harassing pro-democracy, Tibetan and human rights groups based abroad.

A separate anti-terrorism proposal could require network operators and service providers fighting for a share of China's $465 billion technology market to build in "backdoors" for government surveillance, hand over encryption keys to Chinese authorities and store user data within China.