"HungryPanda riders say Chinese police intimidating families in China over Sydney protests", Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 18 Feb 2026

Riders embroiled in a dispute over pay and conditions with food delivery company HungryPanda in Sydney say Chinese police have summoned family members back home and even threatened to have them arrested upon return as part of a pressure campaign to stop them protesting.

Former HungryPanda delivery driver Wang Zhuoying [...] accused it of slashing her orders after she organised protests against it.

She said she had recently received three separate phone calls from police from her home province in China which made her feel "targeted" and "intimidated".

Another delivery driver in the group, Wang Caifa, said that earlier this month he received a "panicked" phone call from his father in China who had just been taken to the local police station.

He told the ABC that the police warned his father that his son was involved in "dangerous activities" overseas.

Many riders [...] maintain access to WeChat, whose mainland version, Weixin, operates under Chinese law and has stated that it complies with authorities' requests in accordance with local regulations.

The ABC has independently verified exchanges between the HungryPanda riders and police, including by examining phone records from one rider showing incoming calls from a police station in central China's Henan province.

The ABC has also reviewed message exchanges from another rider with an officer identifying themselves as police from eastern Zhejiang province, as well as verifying the phone number and WeChat accounts involved.

The ABC sent questions to HungryPanda and WeChat about the intervention by Chinese police but they did not initially respond.

HungryPanda said in a later interview that it was "not aware of the situation".

"It must be their own words in the WeChat group [that] triggered attention from cyber police," media spokesperson Kitty Lu said.