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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 19 Jan 2009Syrian authorities have blocked access to the personal blog of the 26-year-old Syrian Human rights activist and blogger Mohammad Al-Abdallah who is blogging at Raye7wmishRaj3 (I’m Leaving and I’m Not Coming Back). Syrian Netizens can access the blocked blog via HTTPS or simply by visiting the mirror blog at http://rwmr.wordpress.com/.0 comment(s)
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 07 Jan 2009Seven different government agencies, including the Ministry of Public Security and the State Council Information Office declared war on Internet smut today. 19 Internet companies, including Google, Baidu, Sina, and others, were cited for "violating public morality and harming the physical and mental health of youth and young people." This guest post by Rebecca MacKinnon analyzes China's latest crackdown on Internet freedoms.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 06 Jan 2009The Pakistan Communication Authority has issued directives to ISPs for the blocking of six web sites. Activist groups are speaking out against the filtering.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 23 Dec 2008Wikileaks, an uncensorable Wikipedia for untraceable mass document leaking and analysis, has released a complete list of banned child pornography sites in Denmark. The problem? Not all of the sites contain child pornography...
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 22 Dec 2008A new report from Wikileaks, obtained from Freedom Against Censorship Thailand (FACT), shows that 1,203 web sites are being secretly filtered in Thailand under the internally noted reason of "lèse majesté."
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 17 Dec 2008Ban.This.URL, a blog documenting and examining online censorship in Australia, reports that Australia's The Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) has released a paper detailing the technical specifications of Australia's proposed Internet filtering plan.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 09 Dec 2008Shortly after we blogged about the blocking of the Wikipedia page for heavy metal band Scorpions' album "Virgin Killer," it was announced that the England-based Internet Watch Foundation had removed the Wikipedia page from their child pornography watchlist.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 09 Dec 2008On Monday, December 8, it was reported that a number of UK Internet service providers have decided to block access to a controversial Wikipedia entry showing an image of a naked girl. The ISPs acted after online watchdog the Internet Watch Foundation warned them that the image might be illegal.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 14 Nov 2008With all of the news lately regarding Australia's Internet filtering scheme, one might think Australia were the first or only country to ever filter the Internet. Since the scheme was announced in 2007, it has garnered significant criticism and little to no applause. I spoke with Australian journalist Antoun Issa about the filtering scheme and its flaws.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 07 Nov 2008Categories: Turkey, Europe, Arrests and legal action, Political filtering, Social filtering, Overblocking, IP blockingTurkey has made headlines lately for its capricious filtering; although previous incidents involved filtering sites which insulted Kemal Ataturk or "Turkishness" in general, lately, the filtering seems nearly impulsive.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 05 Nov 2008New Firefox add-on China Channel allows Internet users to take a glimpse into life behind the Great Firewall of China. The OpenNet Initiative speaks with the creators of China Channel to learn how the tool works, what its constraints are, and the impetus behind the project.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 28 Oct 2008Australian Communications Minister Stephen Conroy's recent announcement that Australia's upcoming filtering scheme would not allow Internet users to opt-out was met with great opposition from the Australian public, as well as some from ISPs. The OpenNet Initiative looks at reactions from Australian and global Internet censorship activists to determine the reasons for opposing such stringent filtering measures.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 26 Oct 2008Categories: Turkey, Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Legislation, Conflict and security filtering
Our friends at Global Voices Advocacy have reported that Blogger.com has been added to the list of sites filtered in Turkey. This latest news of filtering comes on the heels of news that Wordpress.com, Richard Dawkins' web site and Google Groups have all been blocked due to the legal actions of Turkish creationist Adnan Oktar. -
By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 25 Oct 2008Australia cracks down on criticism of its latest filtering scheme.
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By: Jillian C. YorkDate: 21 Oct 2008Under Australia's new Internet filtering scheme, citizens will be unable to opt out of inclusion. Instead, they will be able to choose between two blacklists; one blocks content inappropriate for children, the other blocks illegal material.
