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WASHINGTON • Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin has been as aggressive as any member of Congress in pressing technology companies to promote Internet freedoms. Last year, he lectured Facebook about the need to protect users from authoritarian regimes.

Today, Durbin focused on Twitter, the microblogging giant that announced last month that it had begun censoring content in countries that restrict Internet use.

Durbin, a Democrat, chairs a Senate Judiciary subcommittee with a wide perview: the Constitution, civil rights and human rights. He is joined in his request to Twitter by Tom Coburn, R-Okla., among the Senate's most conservative members.

A letter from Durbin and Coburn to Twitter CEO Dick Costolo this morning began by praising the San Francisco-based company for providing "an important tool to democracy and human rights activists."

But it raised a series of questions such as what procedures Twitter will use when it receives a censorship request from a foreign government.

Twitter was vague on details when the company declared in a blog post on Jan. 26: "Starting today, we give ourselves the ability to reactively witthold content from users in a specific country - while keeping it available in the rest of the world."

The Durbin-Coburn letter asks, among other things, how Twitter determines whether requests from presumably authoritarian governments are valid.

Among other questions to Twitter:

• Do you make an assessment of whether complying with such a request may put the human rights of the Twitter user at risk?

• Do you assess whether such a request complies with international human rights laws?

• Where do you store the private information of your users?

The senators also pressed Twitter to join the Global Network Initiative, an alliance of Internet and technology companies who have agreed to submit to a voluntary code of conduct that involves protecing human rights.

Twitter has thus far has balked, responding two years ago that the company hadn't had the time to "fully evaluate" the initiative but, initially, considered it "better suited to bigger companies."

In renewing the request to join, Durbin and Coburn observed that Twitter has grown to the point where it has users in nearly every country in the world.

"Twitter clearly faces the significant human rights issues that the (initiative) is designed to help companies address, namely government pressure to violate the freedom of expression and user privacy," the letter reads.

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Durbin wants explanation of Twitter's new censorship policy

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"We understand that Twitter has an obligation to comply with legal requests that do not violate human rights, and we appreciate that you are taking steps to minimize the impact of censorship," the senators wrote. "However, your announcement leaves important questions unanswered."

The lawmakers also encouraged Twitter to join the Global Network Initiative, a voluntary code of conduct for tech companies that require participating organizations to take reasonable measures to protect human rights. Twitter has reportedly avoided joining GNI in the past, according to the letter, which cites a 2010 letter from Twitter's general counsel stating the company thought the code "is better suited to bigger companies."

The following is the full text of the letter, as posted by Forbes on Wednesday afternoon.

February 15, 2012

Dick Costolo
Chief Executive Officer
Twitter, Inc.
795 Folsom Street, Suite 600
San Francisco, CA  94107

Dear Mr. Costolo:

We write to request more information about Twitter's human-rights policies and practices.

We commend you for providing an important tool to democracy and human-rights activists. Twitter has helped activists in the Middle East and elsewhere to organize demonstrations and publicize human-rights abuses. At the same time, Twitter and other social networking technology have created what Internet expert Evgeny Morozov calls "a digital panopticon" that repressive regimes use to crack down on activists. As Scott Shane wrote in The New York Times, "A dissident's social networking and Twitter feed is a handy guide to his political views, his career, his personal habits and his network of like-thinking allies, friends, and family."

Freedom of Expression

Our inquiry is prompted by Twitter's recent announcement that it would begin censoring content in particular countries. "Tweets still must flow," a Twitter blog post on January 26, 2012, said, "Starting today, we give ourselves the ability to reactively withhold content from users in a specific country - while keeping it available in the rest of the world" (http://blog.twitter.com/2012/01/tweets-still-must-flow.html). The Twitter Help Center page on "Country Withheld Content" further explains, "if we receive a valid and properly scoped request from an authorized entity, it may be necessary to reactively withhold access to certain content in a particular country from time to time" (https://support.twitter.com/articles/20169222).

We understand that Twitter has an obligation to comply with legal requests that do not violate human rights, and we appreciate that you are taking steps to minimize the impact of censorship, by, for example, making censored content available outside the country where it is withheld, only censoring content in response to a government request, and providing notice when a tweet is censored.  However, your announcement leaves important questions unanswered.  Please respond to the following questions:

1.      What procedures does Twitter follow when you receive a request from a foreign government to withhold content?  Are these procedures in writing?  Have Twitter's employees been trained in these procedures?

2.      Do you maintain a written record of all such requests?

3.      How do you determine whether such a request is "valid and properly scoped"?

4.      Do you require that such a request follow the legal process required by the foreign government's laws?

5.      Do you make an independent assessment of whether such a request complies with the foreign government's laws?

6.      Do you assess whether such a request complies with international human rights laws?

7.      If you determine that such a request violates the foreign government's and/or human rights laws, how do you proceed?

8.      In what circumstances would you decline or challenge in court such a request?

9.      Which Twitter official is ultimately responsible for authorizing the withholding of content?

We are also concerned about whether Twitter has in place adequate safeguards to protect the privacy of its users. We commend Twitter for allowing the use of pseudonyms, which is an important protection for democracy and human-rights activists in countries with repressive governments. We understand that Twitter must cooperate with legitimate law enforcement efforts, and we appreciate that Twitter attempts to notify a user before turning over his or her private information. A Twitter blog post on January 28, 2011, "The Tweets Must Flow," states, "While we may need to release information as required by law, we try to notify Twitter users before handing over their information whenever we can so they have a fair chance to fight the request if they so choose" (http://blog.twitter.com/2011/01/tweets-must-flow.html).  Again, important questions remain unanswered.  Please respond to the following questions:

1.      What procedures does Twitter follow when you receive a request from a foreign government for the private information of a Twitter user?  Are these procedures in writing?  Have Twitter's employees been trained in these procedures?

2.      Do you maintain a written record of all such requests?

3.      Do you make an assessment of whether complying with such a request may put the human rights of the Twitter user at risk?

4.      Do you require that such a request follow the legal process required by the foreign government's laws?

5.      Do you make an independent assessment of whether such a request complies with the foreign government's laws?

6.      Do you assess whether such a request complies with international human rights laws?

7.      If you determine that such a request violates the foreign government's and/or human rights laws, how do you proceed?

8.      In what circumstances would you decline or challenge in court such a request?

9.      Which Twitter official is ultimately responsible for authorizing the disclosure of private user information?

10.  In what circumstances do you notify a Twitter user that you have handed over his or her information?

11.  Where do you store the private information of your users?

Global Network Initiative

As you know, we have urged Twitter to join the Global Network Initiative (GNI), a voluntary code of conduct for internet and communications technology companies that requires participating companies to take reasonable measures to protect human rights.  We believe that the GNI has potential to advance human rights if member companies fully implement the GNI's principles and the GNI's membership is expanded.

In a February 19, 2010 letter, Twitter's General Counsel told us, "[W]e have not had the luxury of time to be able to fully evaluate GNI.  It is our initial sense that [GNI] is better suited to bigger companies."  As the GNI testified at a March 2, 2010 hearing on internet freedom that we held, GNI membership dues and requirements differ based on a company's size and resources:  "While membership requires executive-level commitment to the principles and GNI framework, implementation of GNI commitments will vary for each company, depending on differences in size, markets, business models, products and services."

We appreciate that joining GNI would require a significant investment of time and resources, but Twitter now has hundreds of employees, over one million active users, and is "used by people in nearly every country in the world" (http://blog.twitter.com/2011/08/your-world-more-connected.html, http://twitter.com/about, http://blog.twitter.com/2011/09/one-hundred-million-voices.html).  Twitter clearly faces the significant human-rights issues that the GNI is designed to help companies address, namely government pressure to violate the freedom of expression and user privacy.

1.      Now that you have had two additional years to evaluate the GNI, will you consider joining?

2.      GNI members undergo an independent assessment and evaluation of their human-rights policies and practices.  Does Twitter undergo such an external audit?  If not, will you?

3.      GNI members employ human rights impact assessments to identify circumstances when freedom of expression and privacy may be at risk when entering new markets; considering potential partners, investments, and suppliers; and introducing new products and services.  Does Twitter conduct such human rights assessments?  If not, will you?

4.      GNI members provide training on human rights, freedom of expression, and user privacy to its employees.  Does Twitter provide such training?  If not, will you?

5.      Please provide a copy of any human rights guidelines and policies that Twitter has in place.

Thank you for your time and consideration.  We look forward to your response at your earliest convenience.

Sincerely,

Richard J. Durbin

Tom Coburn, M.D.

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Twitter Censorship Guidelines Questioned by U.S. Senators [FULL TEXT]

London, Feb 15 (ANI): A leading British lawyer has condemned new European regulations that force websites to delete data on users' request, saying such rules could transform search engines like Google into a 'censor-in-chief for the European Union, rather than a neutral platform'.

According to the current European proposal from Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding, various websites will be forced to delete information shortly after consumers request it be removed.

If they do not comply, a fine of up to two per cent of a firm's global turnover could be imposed, The Telegraph reports.

Prof Jeffrey Rosen, writing in the Stanford Law Review, is a legal publication run by Stanford Law School students since 1948, argued that the fear of fines will have a chilling effect, and that it will be hard to enforce across the Internet when information is widely disseminated.

"Although Reding depicted the new right as a modest expansion of existing data privacy rights, in fact it represents the biggest threat to free speech on the Internet in the coming decade," Rosen, wrote.

"Unless the right is defined more precisely when it is promulgated over the next year or so, it could precipitate a dramatic clash between European and American conceptions of the proper balance between privacy and free speech, leading to a far less open Internet," he added.

Prof Rosen raised the further fear that "the proposed European regulation treats takedown requests for truthful information posted by others identically to takedown requests for photos I've posted myself that have then been copied by others."

He warns that if the regulations are implemented as currently proposed, "it's hard to imagine that the Internet results will be as free and open as it is now." (ANI)

Read more:
European regulations demanding web censorship 'will turn Google into censor-in-chief for EU'

Millions of Iranians have suffered serious disruptions to email and social networking services, raising concerns authorities are stepping up censorship of opposition supporters ahead of parliamentary elections next month.

Iranians have grappled with increased obstacles to using the internet since opposition supporters used social networking sites to organise widespread protests after the disputed 2009 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The government denied any fraud in the vote, which ignited street protests that were crushed violently by security services after eight months.

The country is preparing to hold parliamentary elections on March 2, the first time Iranians will go to the polls since President Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election.

The new internet blockade affected the most common form of secure connections from Friday, according to outside experts and Iranian bloggers.

Traffic was said to have returned to normal on Monday.

"I haven't been able to open pages for days but now it's working again, although slowly," said Hamid Reza, a 20-year-old student in Tehran who was reluctant to give his surname.

The cut-off appeared to target all encrypted international websites outside Iran that depend on the Secure Sockets Layer protocol, which display addresses beginning with https, according to Earl Zmijewski of Renesys, a US company that tracks internet traffic worldwide.

Google, which uses SSL for its Gmail service, reported that traffic from Iran to its email system fell precipitously.

Iran's Ministry of Communications and Technology denied knowledge of the disruption.

"The government is testing different tools," said Hamed Behravan, who reports on Iranian technology issues for the US Government-funded Voice of America.

"They might have wanted to see the public reaction."

National internet system

Many Iranians are concerned the government may be preparing to unveil its much documented national internet system, effectively giving the authorities total control over what content Iranian users will be able to access.

The authorities say it is designed to speed up the system and filter out sites that are regarded as "unclean".

"The internet is an uninvited guest which has entered our country," said Mohammad Reza Aghamiri, a member of the Iranian government's Internet filtering committee.

"Because of [the internet's] numerous problems, severe supervision is required."

He told the daily Arman that internet search engines like Google were a threat to the country.

"We have never considered Google as appropriate to serve Iranian users, because Google is at the service of the CIA," he said. "It has adopted a vivid hostile stance against us."

Iranian authorities have vowed to quell any public protest against the protracted house arrest last year of opposition Green movement leaders, Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi.

"It could just be a coincidence but my guess is that the system was looking to block communication between opposition supporters," said an Iranian analyst who did not want to be named.

The disruption has riled some Iranian members of parliament and they have vowed to look for those responsible.

An MP, Ahmad Tavakoli, told the semi-official Mehr News Agency that the issue was creating widespread discontent that could "cost the establishment dearly".

"This filtering leads people to break the law, and using proxies makes the blocking of sites and signals ineffective, because using proxies becomes widespread," he said.

Authoritarian Arab governments under popular pressure have sought to shut down Internet service to make it harder for opponents to mobilise protests but with little success.

(Additional reporting by Joseph Menn in San Francisco; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Copyright Reuters. Click for restrictions.

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Censorship fears as Iran's internet disrupted

Mumbai:  Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal today said India does not intend to censor online social networks such as Facebook, but demanded that they obey the same rules governing the press and other media.

"I want to say once and for all, without any obfuscation, no government in India will ever censor social media," Mr Sibal said at an IT summit in Mumbai.

"I never wanted to censor social media and no government wants to do so. But like the print and electronic media, they have to obey the laws of the country," added Mr Sibal.

He held a number of meetings with leading Internet companies late last year in which he asked about the possibility of pre-screening content posted online by users.

Mr Sibal reportedly showed executives examples of obscene images found on the Internet that risked offending Muslims or defaming politicians, including Congress President Sonia Gandhi.

Since then, 19 Internet firms including Google, Yahoo! and Facebook have been targeted in criminal and civil cases lodged in lower New Delhi courts, holding them responsible for content posted by users of their platforms.

The government has given its sanction for the firms to be tried for serious crimes such as fomenting religious hatred and spreading social discord, offences that could land company directors in prison.

Google and Facebook said earlier this month that they had removed the allegedly offensive content used as evidence in the court cases.

The groups have appealed to the Delhi High Court asking for the cases against them to be quashed on the basis that they cannot be held responsible for the actions of their clients.

The comments of a judge hearing the case raised further fears that freedom of expression online could be restricted.

"You must have a stringent check. Otherwise, like in China, we may pass orders banning all such websites," the judge said during a hearing in January.

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No censorship for social media, but laws must be followed: Sibal