Mediaboss Marketing

Chinese censors blocked information on the blind activist at the center of a diplomatic storm this year.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Hong Kong (CNN) -- Draconian laws, brutal attacks against bloggers and politically motivated surveillance are among the biggest threats to Internet freedom emerging in the last two years, according to a new report from free speech advocates, Freedom House.

"Freedom on the Net 2012: A Global Assessment of Internet and Digital Media," looked at barriers to access, limits on content, and violations of user rights in 47 countries across the globe. Estonia was rated as having the greatest degree of Internet freedom, while Iran, Cuba and China were viewed as the most restrictive.

While social media was key in the uprising in Egypt, censorship there continues apace, says Freedom House, a U.S.-based independent watchdog organization.

Although online activism is increasing, the report said authoritarian regimes were employing a wider and increasingly sophisticated arsenal of countermeasures.

Read more: The full report

According to Freedom House, China has the world's largest population of Internet users, yet the authorities operate the most sophisticated system of censorship. Its "great firewall" has become notorious for literally shutting down Internet "chatter" it views as sensitive. Earlier this year, censors blocked related search terms to prevent the public from obtaining news on prominent human rights activist Chen Guangcheng, who caused a diplomatic storm when he escaped house arrest to seek refuge in the U.S. Embassy in Beijing.

Read more: News on blind activist's escape

Major web portals and social networking sites, though not state-owned, have had to comply with strict government censorship rules -- or risk being shut down. After launching a campaign to clean up "rampant online rumors," Chinese authorities in March ordered the country's leading micro-blogging sites -- including Sina Weibo -- to disable their comment function for three days. In China, bloggers are also required to register their real names -- though it's not clear how many have complied with the rules.

See the original post here:
Big Brother still watching: Internet censorship on the up, report says

Published: Sept. 28, 2012 at 3:13 PM

WAHINGTON, D.C., Sept. 28 (UPI) -- Internet censorship is increasing as authoritarian regimes attempt to impose more restrictions on online activism, a U.S. watchdog organization reports.

Free speech group Freedom House said repressive laws, violent attacks on bloggers and government surveillance are among the biggest emerging threats to Internet freedom, CNN reported Friday.

Freedom house analyzed restriction of access, content censorship and violations of users' civil rights in 47 countries.

Iran, Cuba and China were the most repressive in terms of restricting Internet usage and freedoms, the group said.

Authorities in China conduct the most sophisticated censorship efforts, Freedom House said, because major Web portals and social networking sites, even though not state-owned, must obey with strict government censorship rules or risk being shut down.

Beijing's influence as an "incubator for sophisticated restrictions" has not gone unnoticed, the group said, with governments including Belarus, Uzbekistan and Iran following China's model for their own Internet crackdowns.

"The findings clearly show that threats to Internet freedom are becoming more diverse," Sanja Kelly, a project director at Freedom House, said.

"As authoritarian rulers see that blocked websites and high-profile arrests draw local and international condemnation, they are turning to murkier -- but no less dangerous -- methods for controlling online conversations."

Read the original here:
Global censorship of Internet on the rise

Government censorship isnt confined to the religious hotbeds of the Eastern Hemisphere: Googles top executive in Brazil was just released from custody after YouTube refused to take down a video critical of a local candidate. The recently freed Fabio Jose Silva Coelho is set for an undetermined court hearing after YouTube did not remove a salacious video allegedly revealing details of a mayoral candidate demanding her lover get an abortion. Since 1965, Brazil bans content that offend the dignity or decorum of the electoral process. Google is appealing the decision that ordered the removal of the video on YouTube because, as a platform, Google is not responsible for the content posted to its site, the company reports.

Brazil has also sided with a few Middle-Eastern and Asian nations in demanding that Google take down an offensive anti-Islamicvideo responsible for deadly riots around the world. Google agreed to censor the video in a few countries, such as Egypt and Libya, but not take it off the site and is (apparently) not taking it down in Brazil either.

The struggle highlights the growing struggle between self-expression, sovereignty, and the pervasiveness of technology.

[Via The Hill, Via Reuters]

Link:
Censorship In The Americas: Google Brazil Chief Just Released From Custody

While Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in New York, his cronies at home are shutting every single one of their citizens out of the internet. Their reasoning: 'we may get attacked by zionist viruses.' Riiiight.

On Sunday, the Iranian state television network announced that Google and Gmail would be blocked "within a few hours." The ban will remain in effect until further notice.

Meanwhile, a government deputy minister announced they were going to put all their citizens in a "domestic internet network." While Iran has blocked sites that go against the government's views in the past, this will cut citizens off the internet completely.

This time they are planning to take everyone off the grid and into their own government-controlled corral. People are not longer going to be able to use virtual private networks to bypass governmental censorship and access information freely.

The deputy communications and technology minister Ali Hakim-Javadi says the operation is already under way: "In recent days, all governmental agencies and offices... have been connected to the national information network."

Officially, every Iranian will be in this cage by March 2013 but the government has not announced yet when they will effectively shut down access to the internet.

With Syria, Egypt and Libya still resonating in their twisted brains, the government and state media are babbling all kinds of excuses to what it seems like a simple move to blindfold its citizens and control the people by having full control of the information they have access to.

The first excuse was given by the Iranian Students' News Agency, who says the blocking was caused by the infamous "Innocence of Islam" video hosted on Google's YouTube service.

The government, however, says that they are doing this because two reasons. First, the "control over the Internet should not be in the hands of one or two countries" (which of course, is pure hypocrisy, given that they are forcing citizens onto their own network).

The second reason is computer attacks by external forces. According to Communications and Technology Minister Reza Taqipour, you can't trust the internet "especially on major issues and during crises." Major issues like Google taking the name Persian Gulf out of Google Maps, or crises like the virus that attacked their nuclear plants. [Reuters]

Read the original post:
Iran Shuts Down Google, Will Completely Cut Citizens Off the Internet [Censorship]

In an interview with DW, Eva Galperin from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, argues that Google's 'pro-active' approach to the censorship of the controversial "Innocence of Muslims" video sets a dangerous precedent.

DW: Do you think the "Innocence of Muslims" video should be banned by Google?

Eva Galperin: I most certainly do not think that the video should be banned, either in the United States or in Egypt and in Libya were Google chose to ban it in spite of the fact that they acknowledged that it was consistent with their terms of service and they had not received any court orders.

Do you believe in free speech at any cost?

I believe in free speech within the limits of US law, which is not completely unadulterated free speech. And furthermore, I do acknowledge that Google does have to obey the law in countries where it receives a valid court order, such as countries where it has offices and is therefore under that country's jurisdiction. I do think that's one of the reasons why Google needs to be extremely circumspect about where they have their offices, because if they want to maintain their devotion to freedom of expression, they need to understand that when they move into other countries where freedom of expression is not as strongly supported, they may have to make these kinds of compromises when they receive court orders in countries like India and possibly Malaysia.

Some critics are calling for a concrete, transnational system of internet governance. Would you approve of such an idea?

Free speech, but not at any cost: Eva Galperin

Worldwide internet governance is highly problematic. Partially because of the clashes between various countries right to autonomy and their right to decide what kind of content is allowed in each country. But also because the US frequently uses these kinds of worldwide treaties or agreements in order to push through its own intellectual property agenda which can often lead to widespread censorship, which we are very concerned about, which we saw with ACTA [Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement], and also what you saw domestically in the United States their attempt to pass SOPA [Stop Online Piracy Act].

Do you think Obama's condemnation of the video can be read as an attack on free speech?

No I don't. I think that the White House has been fairly clear in its support of freedom of speech, while at the same time condemning the violence. There is nothing about condemning the violence that necessitates the censorship of this video. I think that by condemning the violence without calling for the censorship of this video, the White House is making it clear that they are putting the blame where it belongs - on the perpetrators of the violence.

Follow this link:
'US administration has put blame where it belongs'