Plum’s IVR (interactive voice response) systems function to provide customers data and information.  Sometimes the information imparted and exchanged is highly classified or highly controversial in nature.

As a company who designs and maintains products like IVR survey, it is a given that the tool will be utilized to transmit data that is private, protected and sometimes provocative.  We provide a tool for companies to solicit, exchange, and impart data (within legal limits of course) that can be used and accessed in a highly secure fashion.

We are able to offer IVR systems that function in this manner in large part because of the type of society we live in, and the laws established by the countries where the bulk of these transactions occur.

Plum is able to guarantee clients security measures like HIPPA and PCI compliancy because of business rules and regulations stipulated by the U.S. government under provisions established in the Constitution.

Companies and citizens in countries like China are not afforded these same protections, and many of their most commonplace interactions are censored.  Researchers from Harvard and the University of Hong Kong conducted a study that comprehensively analyzed the quantity and type of censorship Chinese authorities engaged in, and they uncovered a very specific, surprising pattern of suppression.

While anyone with basic knowledge of Chinese politics over the last 50 or so years would assume that the most common type of censorship would be found within commentary that criticized the government, governmentally-critical post were actually not stringently regulated.  The type of commentary that was immediately identified and removed had to do instead with content that advocated assemblies, protests and other such gatherings.

This is shocking and interesting because it now appears that the Chinese government does not particularly care how they appear, but instead is utilizing censorship to actually repress and control the actions of their constituents.

Per an article in The Economist, the goal has never been total control, but rather to ensure that the Chinese Communist Party is solidly in power and it remains so.

With this newly developed software, researchers can formulate a very clear picture of how, when, where, and why content is being censored and removed, and thus pinpoint the issues that are of gravest concern to governmental authorities.

Basically, this software is offering researchers a real-time glimpse into how Chinese authorities think and react, in a more intimate way than has ever been possible before.  The findings are guaranteed to be compelling, so stay tuned for updates in the weeks upcoming…