China has implemented a strict system of Internet regulations. However, the Human Flesh Search Forum (HFSF) has encouraged a new cyber culture of citizen participation and information exchange, that attracts decentralized, diverse, private, and grassroots virtual communities. In this exploratory analysis, we applied the notions of crowd-sourcing, panopticon, and synopticon to examine methods by which unrelated citizens collaboratively conduct cyber surveillance as part of the central surveillance system. After analyzing the forum, the results suggest that collective cyber surveillance creates the phenomena of decentralized, immersive participation; a non- rational spiral of silence; and an imbalanced distribution of power between interactions in this digital age.