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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 05 May 2011
Internet censorship is a hot topic in 2011, but also one that reveals the disturbing double-standards of politicians and governments around the world. This week U.S. Senator Dick Durbin sent China’s largest search engine a letter asking them to stop censoring their search results. A noble attempt, but at the same time U.S. politicians are encouraging Google to censor piracy related terms from their search results.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 05 May 2011
Ahead of May 3 World Press Freedom Day, a new study of 37 countries gives the state of play for internet freedom in six African states.
Here’s the pecking order: South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Zimbabwe … and Ethiopia. (Yes, there’s a place even more restrictive than Zimbabwe.)
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 04 May 2011
China has set up a new government body to control information on the internet.
The State Internet Information Office will take over responsibility from a number of lower-ranking directorates.
The new set-up will enable the government to keep a tighter grip on the content available to Chinese internet-users inside the country.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 04 May 2011
The Information Technologies and Communications Authority (BTK) has dismissed claims that a new regulation will bring a series of censors on Internet access through four filtering options to be made compulsory for Internet users in Turkey.
BTK President Tayfun Acarer told the Anatolia news agency that the media has distorted the aim of the new regulation and interpreted reactions against it as “political.” Acarer said he was surprised to see the filters being perceived as censorship and argued that similar regulations are implemented in European countries as well and that the number of banned websites in Britain and Germany is three times that of Turkey.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 04 May 2011
When Apple’s iPad went on sale recently in Turkey it sold out in less than an hour. The voracious appetite of Turks for web gadgetry seems matched only by the Turkish government’s desire to control access to the Internet.
Turkey already has the unenviable record of banning more sites than any other European country. The number is believed to be around 12,000, although official figures haven’t been released since 2009. Now the number seems set to skyrocket following the adoption of new regulations by the Turkish Telecommunications Directorate, or TİB, which administers the internet. TIB has recently banned the use 138 words on Turkish domain sites.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 04 May 2011
The Chinese government announced Wednesday the setting up of an office to manage Internet information in a statement of the State Council General Office.
The department, known as the State Internet Information Office, will direct, coordinate and supervise online content management and handle administrative approval of businesses related to online news reporting, it said.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 03 May 2011
Considerations by the European Union to create a more "secure European cyberspace" by requiring ISPs to block "illicit content" have come under attack from anti-censorship groups, who compare the plan to China's system for controlling citizen's online access.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 03 May 2011
The Citizen Lab is the recipient of this year’s press freedom award of the Canadian Committee for World press Freedom (CCWPF),
The 13th annual Press Freedom Award goes to a Canadian person or group who has defended or advanced the cause of freedom of expression. The Citizen Lab team, based at the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto, was selected for its ongoing dedication to free expression online through work that exposes cases of Internet censorship and espionage around the world.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 03 May 2011
The future of the Internet is at stake in Monday's Canadian election.
Candidates representing all major political parties have declared themselves "pro-internet Candidates" by pledging support for an open internet on the grassroots website Openmedia. Only one candidate among the dominant Conservative party has signed. Other parties are more strongly represented, with the NDP having 50 signed candidates; the Greens, 64; and the Liberals, 83.
Openmedia's agitation on digital policy issues gained attention earlier this year when almost half a million Canadians signed an online petition decrying punishingly low bandwidth caps and Usage Based Billing (UBB). The campaign went viral, forcing a climbdown on the issue by Canada's major ISPs. Those ideas, however, have since been revived.
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By: Rebekah Heacock
Date: 03 May 2011
The world’s worst online oppressors are using an array of tactics, some reflecting astonishing levels of sophistication, others reminiscent of old-school techniques. From China’s high-level malware attacks to Syria’s brute-force imprisonments, this may be only the dawn of online oppression.
