Beijing has warned of a "crackdown" on random violent crimes in 2025, in the wake of a spate of mass attacks on the public in the final months of 2024.
Experts say the government fears the attacks are undermining social stability with videos of the incidents being widely shared on Chinese social media before being censored.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) warning came in a message issued on Christmas Day which outlined eight government priorities in the New Year period.
One of the priorities was to "strengthen the safety precautions of crowded places" to "eliminate hidden dangers to public security".
"In accordance with the law, we will severely crack down on serious violent crimes," said the statement published by state media Xinhua.
While the mass attacks were not explicitly mentioned, the message referred to sports venues, where one of the attacks took place, and knives, which was the weapon used in another of the attacks.
Two of the attackers were sentenced last week, with their trials concluding much more quickly than is usual in China.
A man who drove into a crowd at a sports centre in China's southern city of Zhuhai on November 11, killing 35 people and injuring 43 more, was found guilty and given a death sentence.
Another man who drove a car into crowd of primary school children in Hunan province on November 20, injuring 18 students and 12 adults, was given a suspended death sentence.
It's unclear if a third man accused of an attack on November 16, in which the 21-year-old allegedly used a knife to kill eight people and injure 17 others at a vocational college in the eastern city of Wuxi, has also been sentenced.
Maintaining social stability was Beijing's top priority, said Chinese and Asian studies associate professor Pan Wang.
The CCP heavily monitors social media platforms, where it is common for words and topics deemed sensitive to be removed — sometimes within minutes.
Dr Wang, from the University of New South Wales, said the government considered the death penalty "an effective means of delivering justice, showing deterrence and maintaining social stability and public order".
"According to the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China, these attacks are serious violence crimes which severely endangered national security, public safety and social order," said Dr Wang.
The men who perpetrated the attacks reportedly cited personal problems as motivations, including a difficult divorce and failing exams.
A national helpline for people experiencing "psychological distress and emotional problems" was also announced by China's health commission on Christmas Day.
Dr Wang said the new phone line was "another means of supporting the government's overriding agenda" of stability.
"The helpline is more a reaction to the growing psychological stress and emotional problems in Chinese society in recent years than a direct response to the November attacks," she added.
Videos reached public quickly
Videos of the attacks reached a wider audience and remained online longer because social media short videos were more difficult for Beijing to censor quickly than text-based posts, according to one expert.
Chinese censorship researcher Maggie Ying Jiang said platforms like Douyin — a Chinese version of TikTok — and its biggest competitor Kuaishou, were transforming how breaking news, including mass attacks, were captured and circulated online.
"These platforms facilitate real-time, visual storytelling that often reaches audiences quickly and effectively," explained Dr Jiang, an associate professor from the University of Western Australia.
The platforms' algorithms also sped up circulation of "emotionally compelling and attention-grabbing content", amplifying stories to larger audiences, she added.
"Their role in raising visibility lies in the immediacy and emotional resonance of short videos, which can circulate widely before official responses are implemented."
Dr Jiang said short videos required more scrutinising than text social media posts.
"Traditional platforms like Weibo have relied heavily on keyword filtering and content moderation, while short-video platforms face the added challenge of monitoring visual and auditory elements," she explained.
'Censorship is not omnipotent'
US-based censorship analyst Eric Liu said he believed user behaviour more than the technical limitations of the censors was responsible for the widespread circulation of the attack videos.
Mr Liu, who previously worked as a censor for Chinese social media platform Weibo, said the government in large part relied on self-censorship to stop the spread of material deemed inappropriate by the government.
"Censorship is not omnipotent," he said.
He said there were now more people in regional and rural areas who were less conscious of censorship laws using short video platforms.
According to a 2024 report from market research firm QuestMobile, 647 million people from small towns or rural areas now have access to the internet in China, and one of their top activities was browsing and posting short videos.
Mr Liu said social media users in general also tended to treat sharing videos and images differently to text posts.
Policies gradually introduced during the past decade had discouraged free speech on text-based social media platforms like Weibo, he said.
"Users act differently now on short-video platforms though," he said.
"They don't have so much fear of authority," he said.
There was a perception that less "opinion" was involved in sharing images and short videos than text posts, so people did not have to worry about being accused of fabrication, he said.
"Many users don't believe sharing such images and videos will be targeted by the government," he said.
