Its Internet limitations frequently tighten around political occasions that are sensitive, also it seems to get done for a yearly assembly of top officials in the capital.

Chinese residents using VPNs, or virtual private networks, to circumvent the net blocks in the state have reported problems joining in the previous week. Astrill, a popular VPN supplier, also warned users on March 4 a day, of possible interruptions before China’s weeklong annual legislative assemblies started.

“Due to political assemblies in Beijing, VPN access from China could be restricted,” said a place on Astrill’s Twitter report. Thank you for comprehension.”

Since that time, Chinese netizens have reported problems with Astrill.

However, the Wall is fluid. China’s Internet restrictions get looser or stricter based on needs that are political.

When a world-wide Internet summit was hosted by China in December in Wuzhen, for example, foreign guests discovered they’d unfettered access to Facebook and other restricted sites at the event website.

But during the Hong Kong pro-democracy demonstrations in Sept. 2014, China cut accessibility to Instagram as pictures of police using tear gas on pupils flooded the photo-sharing platform.

When it comes to VPNs China usually keeps one eye open, one eye close. Foreign-run VPNs are not technically legal in the state. But China’s leaders do understand that the innovators in the nation should understand what goes on outside its boundaries when they would like to develop internationally competitive products.

And it is a smallish subset of Chinese citizens that are internet-savvy enough to subscribe to VPN services in the first place — since the sites of leading VPN suppliers are blocked in China.