[PikachuEXE]

The security laws are sometimes called "public toilet laws" in local forums: they cover so broad in terms of behaviour and apply to everyone (not just on the planet the whole Universe).

I live in Hong Kong for over 3X years.

Feel free to ask me questions about Hong Kong (I am monitoring replies via RSS feed).

[SixDouble5321]

How scary is the thought of going back, if only for a short visit?

[PikachuEXE]

It depends who you are.

If you are a existing target/enemy of CCP, you will probably be grabbed secretly (happens before all these laws introduced but probably not that frequent) or grabbed publicly under "diversion" in NSL (most commonly used excuse).

If you are a citizen of a strong democratic country (e.g US, UK, Australia, Japan...), you should be fine for this few months. (I can only dare to predict the next few months)

If you are a citizen of a weaker democratic country (e.g Taiwan, some smaller Europe countries), you should avoid visiting. Not saying you will be immediate or imminent danger but no point risking it (depends on your purposes).

Since the big local press companies like Apple Daily are forced to be shutdown or scared away, corruption start spreading. Accidents and human errors become more covered up / under-reported. (e.g. deaths after vaccine shots, MTR station could be lethal accidents, murders rate raising)

There is less to no feedback once the powerful people (not just the government, local big companies too) misbehave accidentally or intentionally. I recommend against visiting HK unless your purposes are worth the increases risks.