The Interior Ministry says its decision to suspend the Chinese social media app Xiaohongshu for one year is not a restriction of free speech. Authorities ordered the restriction of the app, known in English as RedNote, last week, citing cybersecurity and fraud concerns.

On Monday, Interior Deputy Minister Ma Shih-yuan (馬士元) clarified that the suspension or access restriction does not constitute a complete blockade, but rather preemptive roadblocks to make it more difficult for users to connect with the app.

Ma stated, “Cute doesn’t necessarily mean harmless; some things are beautiful but toxic.” He noted that the platform was involved in 1,706 fraud cases over the past two years involving more than NT$240 million (US$7.7 million).

The deputy minister issued a one-year suspension of the service’s DNS after it failed to respond to his letters regarding the cases. Ma said this is in accordance with Article 42 of the Fraud Crime Hazard Prevention Act and is currently the most severe measure the Taiwanese government can take. Should Xiaohongshu fail to improve its platform within the year, Ma says the suspension will continue.

Ma explained that saying the government “blocked” Xiaohongshu is not accurate, and that the DNS suspension means the webpage won’t be found directly, and the IP address that connects the app to the webpage will be shut down. New IP addresses can still connect, albeit at a slower and more unreliable speed.

VPN services may circumvent the suspension and allow access to the app, but the government is not seeking to punish users who use them, Ma said. The government has a responsibility to inform the public that using the service carries a very high risk, as it can skim and steal various personal data, including financial account and credit card information, the deputy minister said.

Responding to external claims that the suspension amounts to suppressing freedom of speech, Ma said it is an irrelevant issue. He said people may continue expressing their opinions on other social media sites, and that the government hopes users will leave what he called an illegal and unsafe platform. To truly understand what suppressing freedom of speech means, Ma added, one can try criticizing Xi Jinping on Xiaohongshu and see what happens.