China has announced on Tuesday that it is set to require telecom operators and internet service providers to report and cooperate with state security officers on possible leak of state secrets, as the country moves further to tighten its grip on communication facilities and discourage political dissent.

The official Xinhua News Agency said that proposed amendments to the Law on Guarding State Secrets will require telecom companies to halt information transmission once they are found to ferry state secrets. Records must be kept, preserved and transferred to investigating authorities.

The proposed reforms followed the recent censorship row that saw internet search leader Google Inc to transfer its Chinese operation from mainland China to Hong Kong last month, where relatively relaxed civil liberties are being observed.

Xinhua said that the new law will now define state secrets as "information that concerns state security and interests and, if leaked, would damage state security and interests in the areas of politics, economy and national defence, among others."

However, analysts said that the new law, which still carries unclear penalties for violators, will not result to significant developments as telecom companies are already required to submit to blanket investigations by authorities.

Mostly affected by the amended law should be the individuals who are accessing the web using local ISPs and companies that do not offer China-based services should not be affected at all.

Overseas websites like Twitter and Facebook, which are already blocked in China, should be generally free from further intervention as well as Google and Yahoo Inc, which drew criticism in 2006 when it shared personal email information to Chinese prosecutors that led to the incarceration of Chinese journalist Shi Tao.

The proposed amendments are set to be approved by the National People's Congress standing committee as the country's leaders are dead set to filter the information accessed by some 384 million Chinese users as they deem information censorship as the key to eliminate unrest.

Human rights advocates said that the purported reforms will be utilised to identify dissidents and consequently punish them, as Beijing lawyer Mo Shaoping said that the new law will eradicate the privacy protection of telcos' clients, adding, "Such regulation will leave users with no secrets at all, since the service providers have no means to resist the police."