A programmer in northern China has been ordered to pay more than 1 million yuan to the authorities for using a virtual private network (VPN), in what is thought to be the most severe individual financial penalty ever issued for circumventing China’s “great firewall.” The programmer, surnamed Ma, was issued with a penalty notice by the public security bureau of Chengde, a city in Hebei province, on August 18. The notice said Ma had used “unauthorised channels” to connect to international networks to work for a Turkish company. The police confiscated the 1.058m yuan ($145,092) Ma had earned as a software developer between September 2019 and November 2022, describing it as “illegal income,” as well as fining him 200 yuan ($27).
Charlie Smith (a pseudonym), the co-founder of GreatFire.org, a website that tracks internet censorship in China, said: “Even if this decision is overturned in court, a message has been sent and damage has been done. Is doing business outside of China now subject to penalties?”
Abstract credit: https://slashdot.org/story/420019
I’m not sure if I understand your point.
If you say their law sucks, their LE agency sucks, they freely interpret their laws in prosecution, etc. , I completely agree with you. But if you’re trying to say using vpn to browse internet in China can risk a big fine, which is what the title of the article is saying, I don’t think it’s accurate. News agency should state the facts, not their ill formed opinions.
It is saying that VPN use was the only excuse given by the authorities when he was "ordered to pay" them a large amount of money. While I don't know for certain that it's true, I still haven't seen anything here or elsewhere to contradict that.