Nart Villeneuve, an Internet censorship researcher, points out that the recent Associated Press article on the cartoon police officers of the Chinese Internet left out an important element of the story. Jingjing and Chacha, as they are called, are there to “help” people when they encounter so-called inappropriate materials.

Nart quotes a story by the official Chinese news agency, Xinhua.

Dong Lin, chief technology officer of Xirang, a Beijing-based hosting service provider, said police have mobilized all forces, from China Netcom, the country’s second largest fixed-line operator, to information security companies such as Symantec, to jointly combat online harmful information.

Symantec is a U.S. company that produces anti-virus and filtering software. It is also a company firmly in the ranks of those companies, built in democracies, that feel quietly confident helping repressive regimes thrive.