Chinese international students living around the world are risking jail time by protesting against the abolition of presidential term limits in their home country.

"Initially me and some of my friends who are in different continents and different universities decided to make some posters and put them up and set up a twitter account and gmail," a Chinese student studying in Australia told Hack.

"Things just started to grow ever since and people have downloaded the posters and put them up at their universities."

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The posters are being put up in Australia at Melbourne and Sydney Universities.

They're also at unis and colleges all over America, the UK, Taiwan, New Zealand, Hong Kong, the Netherlands and Argentina.

The student we spoke to, who we'll call Mark, was extremely paranoid about speaking publicly because he was concerned someone from the Chinese Government would find out.

So we had to speak over an encrypted messaging service that no one could track.

"We're facing retaliation from the Chinese Government once we're exposed because there'll be jail time without due process," he said.

"We're not Australian residents and we're definitely going to turn back to China and that's a huge security risk.

"We're in western countries where free speech is protected and we think we're morally obliged to do something, stand up and speak for our people."

So what are the students protesting?

Chinese president Xi Jinping has been allowed to remain in office forever and his political school of thought has been made a part of the Chinese constitution.

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Whatsapp Chinese President Xi Jinping drops his ballot during a vote on a constitutional amendment lifting presidential term limits.

It's basically like Malcolm Turnbull being Prime Minister for the rest of his life.

The communist party says this will allow Xi Jinping to guide China to rise as a superpower in the world.

However, critics say this is a step backwards and moving towards creating a North Korean-style rule.

The Chinese Government has quickly blocked some articles criticising this change and are publishing pieces in local media praising the Communist party like this.

"In China, the discussion of politics is highly censored especially about repealing the term limits is either banned or deleted," Mark told Hack.

What does the Australian Government have to do with this?

The student Hack spoke to is one of more than 50,000 Chinese International students studying in Australia which is the most of any country.

They also bring in a lot of money but Mark is calling for the Australian Government to stop allowing the Chinese Government to have ties here.

"What we want the Australian Government to do is to investigate thoroughly the ties between the Chinese embassy and consulate and these organisations," he said.

Mark and the other international students want Chinese education centres called Confucious Institutes and Chinese Student Associations in universities around the world to be abolished.

There have long been allegations that these groups have been a tool for the Communist Party to spread their ideals in countries like Australia.

The students say these are even worse now that Xi Jinping is so powerful.

"The entire Confucious institute thing is something the Chinese Government has been developing over years," Mark said.

"The ultimate goal is to project their values overseas and that's something Xi Jinping encourages."

Mark is calling on Chinese students studying overseas to make their voices heard.

"I want to say to all of you out there who is listening... Please don't let fear get to you," he said.

"Because fear is what they use to manipulate you, definitely protect yourself to fight another day and express your ideas.

"The things you think are right that you think is something powerful against this regime, this dictatorship. Be brave, but be safe."