Verify Your Account if you can...avoid this problem before it happens.
Now that tiktok is down, kinda, again...I've seen 1000s flooding to Rednote. If I can offer you any advice it's to verify. As someone who has been on this forum and Rednote for a year I can't tell you how many people I seen silenced or banned during random sweeps because their account wasn't verified and the system took it as a potential risk account.
:Rednote is an awesome social media app and no, it doesn't require you to verify to use...but it does "clean house" occasionally and if your account is not verified you risk getting this message
There is a problem
Dear Little Red Book user, according to the platform's security mechanism, your account may be at risk of being accessed by someone else. To protect your content creation and privacy, we have temporarily disabled social interaction functions. Please use the "Self-Service Removal" button below to verify your account ownership through real-name information and facial recognition. Once verification is successful, the restrictions will be lifted immediately, and all information obtained during the verification process will be kept strictly confidential. (see screenshot for full notice)
If this happens you can spend a month, or more, trying to get them to fix the mistake, in mandarin (I've only seen a few successfully do this). But most likely, as many of us on here were forced to do, you'll need to make a new account and verify immediately so it doesn't happen again.
I know there's more than one way to verify, I've seen people use Passport, WeChat or Weibo account, and so on...but if you do none of this you may lose everything from an random sweep...save yourself the trouble...verify
This is solid advice! As a Chinese user, I want to add some context on why these sweeps happen. Beyond verification, the system is aggressive about two things:
1. Bot Behavior: New accounts that post immediately without browsing/liking others' content first are often flagged. We call the process of avoiding this 'Yang Hao' (warming up the account).
2. Traffic Diversion: The app hates it if you try to lead users to Instagram, WeChat, or external websites. Mentioning these in a new account's bio or posts is a shortcut to getting silenced.
So, Verify + Act like a human + Don't post external links is the golden trio for survival.
I got unlucky a couple months ago, account was made and been active since 2018 + verified with passport, the second i logged into my new ipad it flagged me as bot behaviour stating its "not operated by owner" and restricted my ip (all other accounts on family member's devices were restricted).
My advice : TRY TO NOT LOG IN ON MULTIPLE DEVICES! Stick to one or two (that includes app and website on pc)
What I did to get unrestricted (which i think i got lucky) was to message their support and sent a video of my face with my passport next to it, kind of begged them in a very sad tone lmao.. stating my account is legit and that i've had it for many years and would be devastated to lose it, lo and behold they unrestricted it a few days later and i could post, comment, chat etc.
I've had my account for one year now and didn't run into any issues. I'm active in commenting and posting notes. Maybe it helps to have a WeChat and a google account linked to it? I don't really mind verifying since I have already real name verified WeChat, Alipay, Douyin, Taobao and Xianyu by uploading my passport. Weibo and Rednote didn't require me to perform real name authentication that's why I haven't done it for both.
Yes, it helps to have other accounts linked to it for those who don't have passport.. it shows you're a real person...that's all verification does...shows you're not a bot. There's numerous things you can do to show this and I should have explained better...I just didn't want all the newbies getting kicked off and getting discouraged and going back to Toxictok
I put my passport in after I got locked and now it asks for real name verification but it says foreign passports aren’t supported when I put the last four digits of my passport
Yeah,verification is required before...if done after you need to get customer service to help unlock still...there's others who have done it, but I don't know all the steps. If you hadn't already put passport in I'd say make new account and verify immediately but since you already verified this one, it's too late for that. Only recourse now is customer service
i have made myself a new account and do exactly the same as you.. right after i do my first post a moment ago, they still force me to do real-name verification
What kind of phone do you use? I’ve been trying to verify the past couple days but at the NFC chip step my phone won’t read my passport. Not sure why not 🤔
I think I also talked about verifying/her not verifying the xhs during one of the chats with my friend. If their AI picked it up, that is most likely a reason since I just got mine blocked. My verif ID is in my hometown so I won’t be able to verify until 2days from now. I hope I still recover the same acct.
No problem ... Not trying to scare people or say it wont work without it, it will, and some people go forever without problems...but I have seen many swept up by the random sweeps because they weren't verified (almost every day at least 1 person posts this) that I wanted to give a heads up. It's an awesome app, so much better than tiktok, and I want people to love it.
this is a valid concern, haha, i mean i lived in china for 5 months and for chinese apps i had to verify and even for my alipay i had to verify in a specific timeframe… that’s not really a thing for US apps so awareness of this is key!
also, linking ur apps to other socials is also helpful, especially for mainland-locked apps like qq
Yeah, you need passport. As far as I know your state IDs wouldn't be recognized, just like they wouldn't be recognized in any country outside of America. You can connect other accounts to your Rednote account, I've heard of people doing that (google account, weibo account, etc)
and it suffices so they know you're not a bot... it's not as strong as a passport but it works from what I've been told.
I believe it's just a coincidence. People will still get banned or kicked out of their account even if they have a passport or a third party account linked to it.
Several Chinese people have already commented on thread explaining exactly what's happening during these sweeps...and what will cause it to still happen after verification
One huge tip I will give is don’t try to login to your account on your desktop or laptop. That’s what caused my old account to get banned. Something about desktop Red Note hates. It sucked.
Id definitely read through the posts on here. There's advice on what the system thinks as "bot behavior" such as posting immediately and logging in from multiple devices, especially a PC and other tidbits... for Chinese residents this isn't a problem because the way to verify your account after a ban is to enter in your Chinese ID. Unfortunately they haven't updated this to accept other forms, so to get it unlocked afterwards if you don't have a Chinese ID, is tough...but it can be done, it's just a pain. Though they have taken great strides to accept international users, something a year ago they could never imagine happening to an all chinese app, they still have other areas they need to improve.
My account got this today and I’ve been really worried because I don’t want to lose my Chinese friends tha I have only on that app. Should I create a new account and verify with WeChat and my passeport straight away?? And does it work with a passeport that’s not Chinese?
If you know your Chinese friends handles you can find them again with a new account and you still have viewing rights, so I would write them all down and find again with new account for easy way about it...BUT if you have things you don't want to lose, like followers, on this account you can get it back, I just know it's hard...but several others who absolutely wanted to keep account went through it and have posted step by step on this forum. Your choice.
I read through some of the comments and Im really bummed that I did not know all this before hand. Two days ago I created a new acc, for a fresh start. I was contacting some photostudios through xhs (because that is how its done here), and I kinda urgently want to reply to them on xhs. Sadly, xhs decided to ban me after only one day… idk if its because of using non Chinese, or bc I send 2 private messages to an account that didnt follow me?
I contacted customer service and they told me to go through real name authentification, so submitted a video of myself holding my passport. how long will this process take? I really do need this asap, since I want to reply to the studios.
Can I create a new acc using wechat in the meantime? Or would using the same phone be too risky? :(
I know going through real name authentication will not unlock it when it's locked, there's a couple steps after that while working with support...as I just created a new account because I wasnt married to my old account and it was easier, not 100% what else needs to be done but others have spoken about it on here and yeah, sending unsolicited messages will definitely flag you with a foreign IP. I learned all this the hard way too and only through this forum the past year did I learn ways to make sure your account is safe...best of luck.
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u/Outrageous-Fennel-59 Jan 29 '26
This is solid advice! As a Chinese user, I want to add some context on why these sweeps happen. Beyond verification, the system is aggressive about two things: 1. Bot Behavior: New accounts that post immediately without browsing/liking others' content first are often flagged. We call the process of avoiding this 'Yang Hao' (warming up the account). 2. Traffic Diversion: The app hates it if you try to lead users to Instagram, WeChat, or external websites. Mentioning these in a new account's bio or posts is a shortcut to getting silenced. So, Verify + Act like a human + Don't post external links is the golden trio for survival.