Certainly one of my stops in China was Shenzhen, the southern metropolis that’s dwelling to many Chinese language tech firms, like Tencent, Huawei, and DJI. I had a number of causes to go to Shenzhen, however there was one which made me nervous: I wished to go to Tencent’s mysterious customer support heart to get my 15-year-old social media account again.

When you didn’t know, the primary software program that launched Tencent’s empire was QQ, the go-to prompt messaging platform in China through the desktop web period. From there, Tencent grew into a strong conglomerate providing blogs, e-mail providers, music and video streaming, gaming, and finally WeChat. For a very long time earlier than WeChat’s success, a QQ account was primarily a digital id—individuals used it to attach with one another and entry every kind of Tencent providers. 

I’ve private archives—together with diary entries, chat histories, {and professional} emails—in QQ that span greater than a decade. However I haven’t been in a position to entry them since November 2021, when my account was immediately suspended. Within the months earlier than that, I had used it to report on a narrative about QQ’s censorship of LGBTQ content material and to attach with sources for different tales I used to be engaged on. Nevertheless it wasn’t clear whether or not that exercise resulted within the suspension. 

I attempted to recuperate my account, however I hit a wall as a result of it was registered with my childhood cellular quantity, which had lengthy been deactivated. I principally gave up on it—till I realized in regards to the customer support heart in Shenzhen.

Coping with customer support can at all times be irritating: lengthy wait instances, boilerplate responses, and unhelpful representatives are the norm. Tencent gives a bodily heart as a final resort. In case you are keen to journey to Shenzhen, you’ll be able to meet with a consultant in particular person to make your case. 

In January, a 16-year-old Chinese language teen went viral after he traveled over 800 miles by himself to the Tencent customer support heart. Like me, he’d had his QQ account suspended. After months of communications with Tencent and formal complaints that went nowhere, he lastly received his account again due to his go to.

I arrived on the customer support heart on a damp April day. The middle is on the primary flooring of an workplace constructing unrelated to Tencent, but only some miles away from the corporate headquarters. It felt weirdly secretive: there was no signal on the outside signifying what it was. A safety guard stood exterior the door and was desirous to query all passersby about why they have been there. 

Once I walked into the reception room, six individuals have been within the line in entrance of me. We have been directed to undergo a safety detector and retailer all our luggage and drinks. No recording, images, or loud conversations are allowed on this heart, the indicators on the wall stated. I attempted to file audio however was quickly seen by one of many three safety guards there. “Sir, you can’t file right here,” he stated, earlier than watching me delete the recording.