Chinese authorities want to cleanse the internet of "bad words," starting from the country's top internet firms. 

Quartz reported that the Chinese government has relayed its plan of censoring a number of bad words online to Tencent and Sina. The authorities reportedly gave a list of 25 words that they do not want its Chinese netizens to be using online. 

Like Us on Facebook

Lu Wei, director of China's cyberspace administration, said that the 25 "vulgar terms" are commonly used by Chinese users in various social media sites such as Sina Weibo. The country's internet police recently started using online social networks to make their efforts known to the public. 

To an outsider, these 25 words may seem rather harmless or funny when translated.  However, in its native Mandarin language, the words can mean something else.

One of the terms that the authorities want removed is "nima" or "your mom" in English.  In Mandarin, it is the equivalent of the F word in English. A recent study conducted by the official People's Daily revealed that Chinese users used "nima" more than 250 million times in 2014.

A spokesperson for the Cyberspace Administration said that Internet companies such as Sina should help in removing vulgar terms from the internet.  The government lamented the fact that even the mainstream media has been using some of those terms in their publications.  State council official Zhang Zhanbin said that the state has posted to more than 500,000 people just to make sure that users in Internet cafes behave themselves.

Journalism professor Hu Yong of Peking University said that the authorities may face resistance in enforcing the ban on dirty words.  He said that telling what online users can and cannot say may result in the decline of the country's vibrant and still growing internet community.

Sina Weibo senior manager Yan Yuanping said that the micro blogging site can implement a filtering setup that could delete the offending terms if a user posts them. The blog service reportedly also has employees whose sole duty is to help "steer" the discussions and comments to the "right" direction.

Other site such as QQ.com are already adopting a similar practice and scrutinizing all commentaries received before posting them online, according to Bloomberg.

TagsBad Words, China censorship, vulgar terms, Chinese Internet Control, chinese online users, Sina Weibo censorship, chinese cyberspace administration, chinese slang, your mom, china online censorship