  For the past 20 years, China has increasingly restricted the access of minors
to online games using addiction prevention systems (APSes). At the same time,
and through different means, i.e., the Great Firewall of China (GFW), it also
restricts general population access to the international Internet. This paper
studies how these restrictions impact young online gamers, and their evasion
efforts. We present results from surveys (n = 2,415) and semi-structured
interviews (n = 35) revealing viable commonly deployed APS evasion techniques
and APS vulnerabilities. We conclude that the APS does not work as designed,
even against very young online game players, and can act as a censorship
evasion training ground for tomorrow's adults, by familiarization with and
normalization of general evasion techniques, and desensitization to their
dangers. Findings from these studies may further inform developers of
censorship-resistant systems about the perceptions and evasion strategies of
their prospective users, and help design tools that leverage services and
platforms popular among the censored audience.
