Before Falun Gong was banned by Chinese government on July 22, 1999, tens of media were under organized attack by Falun Gong for reporting cases of death and mental disorder due to practicing Falun Gong.
The well-known media that have been besieged include: Guangming Daily, CCTV, China Youth Daily, Beijing TV Station, Shenyang TV Station, Liaoning Daily, Nangfang Daily, Nanfang City News, Zhejiang Daily (Qiantang Weekend), Qianjiang Evening News, Qilu Evening News, Health News Digest, West China City Daily,Nanfang Rural News, Hebei Politics and Law News, Xinjiang Economic News, Wujing Daily, Xiamen Daily, Chinese Business View, Fuzhou Daily, Hefei Evening News, Chongqing Daily, Chengdu Business Daily, Cangzhou Daily, etc.
Hundreds of Falun Gong members sat at the gate of the news media with Falun Gong music playing. Some of them spread Falun Gong leaflets to passerby regardless of their attitude. Some of them swarmed offices to nag the editors and staff at work. Some made chain phone calls to harass the editors and reporters to such an extent that the editor-in-chief had to change his phone number...The Falun Gong followers even gave "warning" when they besieged the Chongqing Daily: If the press refused to apologize, we would destroy the unit with floods or even destroy the whole world before the due date preset by Li Hongzhi.
All these media organizations are located across the country.
On June 17, 1996, the Guangming Daily published an authored commentary in its opinion column. The commentary is titled Alarm should Always Sound in Opposing Pseudoscience: A Topic Arising from Zhuan Falun. The Falun Gong organizers in Beijing blocked the gate of the newspaper office in the name of holding Falun Gong Training Classes, some practitioners even threatened to "protect the Fa even at the cost of life." One day in August 1996, a group of Falun Gong practitioners gathered at the gate again, demanding Xin Ping, the author of the article to apologize to Falun Gong.
From June 1 to 3, 1998, Qilu Evening News office was besieged illegally by over 3,000 Falun Gong practitioners for this newspaper published three articles in April that year including What is Falun Gong?
On May 4, 1998, the Health News Digest published this article under another title Illegal and Harmful Falun Gong. The Falun Gong backbones organized over 400 practitioners to gather and make troubles at the gate of the office from June 8.
On May 24, 1998, the Beijing TV Station presented a program in its Beijing Express called Can the Certification Control Sweep out the False Qigongs. This program mentioned a case that one Falun Gong practitioner went crazy. Consequently the TV station was besieged by thousands of Falun Gong practitioners.
After this event, in his "lection" Digging Out the Roots Li Hongzhi claims: "Some newspapers, radio stations and TV stations in various parts of the country have...harmed our Dafa...This was deliberately harming Dafa and cannot be ignored...Dafa disciples in Beijing adopted a special approach to ask those people to stop harming Dafa – this actually was not wrong."
In the same article, Li Hongzhi warns those Falun Gong people that didn't take part in the besiegement: "At the crucial moment when I ask you to break away from humanness, you do not follow me. Each opportunity will not occur again."
After being affirmed by Li Hongzhi, the Falun Gong disciples became more encouraged and fearless.
From April 19 to 23, 1999, the Tianjin Education College was besieged illegally by over ten thousand Falun Gong practitioners for the college magazine Science Review for Juvenile published an article by physicist He Zuoxiu titled I don't Agree with Teenagers Practicing Falun Gong which identified some problems of Falun Gong.
In Western countries Falun Gong exploits the besiegement and excessive lawsuit as a tool to protect its interest and never feels shame.
In December 2001, the Chinese media in North America region the China Press USA (Qiao Bao), Sing Tao Daily and Ming Bao were besieged by Falun Gong for publishing a report Fu Yibin Kills his Father and Wife.
On November 3, 2001, a Canadian pressLa Presse Chinoise (Chinese Press)published an article criticizing Falun Gong which is a personal narrative of He Bing, a former female Falun Gong member. However, Falun Gong lodged a lawsuit against the newspaper for its "libel." On December 7, 2005, the Supreme Court of Quebec of Canada made a final ruling for this four years long case: the accuser lost the suit. The written judgment points out: "Falun Gong is a controversial movement, which does not accept criticism."
In 2002, the Falun Gong organization in Victoria lodged a complain to Victoria Equity Committee against the Australia newspaper Huaxia Business for reason of discrimination because this newspaper reported a Falun Gong concerned activity held in Melbourne Chinatown by a Chinese community. In December 2004, the Victoria Equity Committee turned down the legal action by Falun Gong. This newspaper spent considerable time, manpower and efforts in dealing with the suit and was greatly annoyed.
In December 2003, the Australian newspaper Chinese Daily published a statement of the Embassy of the People's Republic of China in Australia, condemning Falun Gong. In May 2004, Falun Gong filed a lawsuit against the Chinese Daily to the supreme court of New South Wales for reason of defamation. After that, Falun Gong employed its media to mock Chinese Daily on a large scale, and made personal attacks on the chief editor and the editors. On April 5, 2006, the supreme court of New South Wales ruled: Falun Gong lost and Chinese Daily won the suit.
On January 21, 2005, the Associated Press (AP) published an article titled Chinese Show off Repentant Falun Gong which presents an objective report of the current status of the persons involved and their meditation on Falun Gong after the self-burning event occurred on the Lunar New Year's Eve of 2001. On the morning of January 25, 2005, Falun Gong organized its followers to protest at the Manhattan-based headquarters, and demanded the AP to withdraw this report. On February 11, Falun Gong media the Epoch Times published an article calling the AP "down-to-earth small bastard."
In the first half of year 2006, the Great Wall Platform cooperated with Rogers Company to apply to CRTC for program broadcasting rights, aiming to spread TV programs relating Chinese culture in Canada. Such a local Chinese cultural and recreational affair was obstructed by Falun Gong by all means. Between March and June of 2006, Falun Gong organized its members for many times to demonstrate before the Rogers' headquarters in Toronto, which severely affected the normal running of Rogers Company. On December 22, 2006, the Great Wall Platform gained permission to open its business in Canada.
On February 6, 2008, the New York Times published a news feature titled A Glimpse of Chinese Culture That Some Find Hard to Watch. Soon after, the Falun Gong websites published dozens of articles successively attacking and defaming New York Times and the author Eric Konigsberg. The articles claimed that Eric Konigsberg was well-known by his ill reputation... and was absolutely inhuman.
In the eyes of Falun Gong, anyone and any media don't have the freedom to criticize Falun Gong. According to the "Supreme Directives" of Li Hongzhi, any criticism of Falun Gong is defaming the Dafa and is not intolerable.
In addition, Falun Gong uses "hacker" to attack websites of interest and forces readers to browse its web pages.
On October 4, 2002, several news websites of Chinese newspapers and magazines in Hongkong were infringed by Falun Gong. When readers were viewing websites like Xing Tao Daily, Ming Daily and Apple Daily, the readers were automatically skipped to Falun Gong website in Canada. Falun Gong used the same techniques to invade famous websites Sina and Sohu.
