| Internet Censorship |
Article Index for Internet Censorship |
Shopping Censorship |
Articles about Internet Censorship |
Website Links For Internet |
Information AboutInternet Censorship |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT INTERNET CENSORSHIP | |
| internet censorship | |
| censorware | |
| privacyinternet censorship | |
| censorware | |
| privacy | |
| internet | |
| censorship | |
| computer law | |
|
Internet censorship is control or suppression of the publishing or accessing of information on the Internet . The legal issues are similar to offline Censorship . One difference is that national borders are more permeable online: residents of a country that bans certain information can find it on Website s hosted outside the country. Conversely, attempts by one government to prevent its citizens from seeing certain material can have the effect of restricting foreigners, because the government may take action against Internet sites anywhere in the world, if they host objectionable material. Barring total control on Internet-connected computers, such as in North Korea , total censorship of information on the Internet is very difficult (or impossible) to achieve due to the underlying distributed technology of the Internet. Pseudonymity and Data Haven s (such as Freenet ) allow unconditional Free Speech , as the technology guarantees that material cannot be removed and the author of any information is impossible to link to a physical Identity or Organization . IMPLEMENTED OR MANDATED BY GOVERNMENTS Pervasive While there is no universally agreed upon definition of what constitutes "pervasive censorship", organizations such as Reporters Without Borders and OpenNet Initiative identify some nations as practicing extreme levels of Internet censorship. Such nations often censor political content and may retaliate against citizens who violate the censorship with measures such as imprisonment. Cuba Cuba has the lowest Latin America ratio of computers per inhabitant and also the lowest internet access.1 Citizens have to use government controlled "access points", where their activity is monitored through IP blocking, keyword filtering and navigation history checking. According to the government, access to internet services by the Cuban population are limited due to high costs and the American embargo, but there are reports concerning the will of the government to control access to uncensored information both from and to the outer world.2. The Cuban government continues to imprison independent journalists for contributing reports through the Internet to web sites outside of Cuba 3 Iran Iran Internet censorship is delegated to ISP s who attempt to filter contents critical of the government, pornographic websites, and political blogs. Iranian bloggers have been imprisoned for their Internet activities by the Iranian government.4 Most recently, the Iranian government has blocked access to video-upload sites such as YouTube.com. Maldives Maldives filters opposition websites and has imprisoned cyber dissidents. 5 6 Myanmar Myanmar has banned the websites of political opposition groups, sites relating to Human Rights , and organizations promoting Democracy in Myanmar . North Korea Only a few thousand citizens in North Korea , a tiny minority of the total population, have access to the Internet, which is heavily censored by the national government. 7 People's Republic of China See Also: Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China The People's Republic Of China blocks or filters Internet content relating to Tibetan Independence , Taiwan Independence , Police Brutality , the Tiananmen Square Protests Of 1989 , Freedom Of Speech , democracy, pornography, some international news sources (such as the BBC ), certain religious movements (such as Falun Gong ), many blogging websites, and Wikipedia . Some 52 cyber dissidents are reportedly imprisoned in China for their online postings.8 Syria Syria has banned websites for political reasons and arrested people accessing them.9 Tunisia See Also: Internet censorship in Tunisia Tunisia has blocked thousands of websites (such as pornography, mail, search engine cached pages, online documents conversion and translation services) and peer-to-peer and FTP transfer. This filtering is performed using a Transparent Proxy and Port blocking. Cyber dissidents including pro-democracy lawyer Mohammed Abbou have been jailed by the Tunisian government for their online activities.10 Uzbekistan Uzbekistan prevents access to websites regarding banned Islamic movements, independent media, NGOs, and material critical of the government's human rights violations. Some Internet cafes in the capital have posted warnings that users will be fined for viewing pornographic websites or website containing banned political material. 11 Vietnam The main networks in Vietnam prevent access to websites critical of the Vietnamese government, expatriate political parties, and international human rights organizations, among others.12 Online police reportedly monitor Internet Cafe s and cyber dissidents have been imprisoned for advocating democracy.13 Substantial South Korea South Korea has banned at least 31 pro- North Korea websites through the use of IP blocking. Saudi Arabia : The most aggressive censorship focused on pornography, drug use, gambling, religious conversion of Muslims, and filtering circumvention tools . See the report by Harvard University's Law School on Documentation of Internet Filtering in Saudi Arabia . United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates forcibly censors the Internet using Secure Computing 's solution. The nation's sole ISP Etisalat bans pornography, politically sensitive material, and anything against the moral values of the UAE. Yemen Yemen's two ISPs block access to contents falling under the categories of gambling, adult contents, and sex education as well as material seeking to convert Muslims to other religions. Nominal Australia See Also: Internet censorship in Australia Brazil A judicial order by Judge Ênio Santarelli Zulianio forbade access to a YouTube video depicting Brazilian model and TV host Daniela Cicarelli performing sexual acts on a beach in Cádiz , Spain . With the widespread circumvention of YouTube policy by video uploaders, two Internet providers - Telefonica and Brasil Telecom - denied all YouTube access to customers - although it was still possible to utilise YouTube with the aid of proxies. Four days after Brasil Telecom blocked YouTube, judge Zulianio ordered the restablishment of free YouTube browsing, maintaining that only the Cicarelli video was to be restricted. Cicarelli later was denied the right to keep the video off the Internet by higher courts. The state of São Paulo was the first state to enact an act requiring cybercafés to keep a user's list with address, full name, date of birth, phone number, and an Identity Card number. Governo Do Estado De São Paulo Canada Project Cleanfeed Canada run by Cybertip.ca and modeled after a similar program in the United Kingdom, ( Cleanfeed ) Canada's largest ISPs (which includes Rogers and Bell Canada) are blocking access to hundreds of child pornography sites from abroad as of November 2006. Denmark European Union , 2007 Fiji In May 2007 it was reported that the military in Fiji had blocked access to web logs critical of the regime16. Finland Finland 's major Internet service providers decided on November 22 , 2006 to begin filtering child pornography, however, the filter is not yet implemented. The blacklist is provided by Finnish police and filtering is probably URI based like the United Kingdom's Cleanfeed. France French courts demanded Yahoo! block Nazi material in the case LICRA Vs. Yahoo . The case is currently on appeal for an En Banc Rehearing . India See Also: Internet censorship in India As Of July 2006 the Indian government has directed ISPs to block seventeen websites, including some hosted on the Geocities , Blogspot and Typepad domains. Initial implementation difficulties led to these domains being blocked entirely.1718 Access to sites on these domains other than the specifically banned ones was restored by most ISPs after about a week.19 The first documented incident of Internet censorship in India was the Yahoo! Groups ban of 23 September 2003 . Kynhun, a Yahoo! group linked to the outlawed " Hynniewtrep National Liberation Council ", a minor separatist group, was ordered banned by the Department of Telecommunications. Difficulties in implementing the ban by the ISP's ultimately led to all Yahoo! groups being banned for a period of about two weeks. Recently, Indian law enforcement has entered an agreement with the popular social networking site . Israel The religious parties in Israel proposed internet censorship legislation would only allow access to adult-content Internet sites for users who agree in advance to identify themselves.20 Italy Italy bans the use of foreign Bookmaker s over the Internet by mandating certain edits to DNS host files of Italian ISPs Italy's ban on foreign operators opens a new front in Europe's battle for a 'common market' for gambling I Know This Is A Trite Title, But ... It's Not Just China (strong language). Morocco As of March 2006, Morocco had blocked access to many blogging sites, such as LiveJournal . Reporters Without Borders says that Morocco now censors all political websites advocating Western Sahara's independence. Google Earth has also been added to the list of censored websites in Morocco. In 2007 Morocco's main telecommunication operator Maroc Telecom also censored YouTube for nearly a month, without giving any reason for that. See Also: Internet censorship in Morocco Norway Norway 's major Internet service providers have a DNS filter which blocks access to sites authorities claim are known to provide child pornography, similar to Denmark's filter. Pakistan See Also: Internet censorship in Pakistan Pakistan has blocked access to websites critical of the government. Currently, the government has blocked blogs hosted on Blogspot.com. A ban on pornographic websites has also been enacted. Russia Russia pressured Lithuania into shutting down the Kavkaz-Center website, a site that hosts videos on attacks on Russian forces in Chechnya, and reports on the Second Chechen War from a Chechen separatist perspective. Singapore In Singapore , three people were arrested and charged with Sedition for posting Racist comments on the Internet, of which two have been sentenced to Imprisonment . Sri Lanka Sri Lanka has blocked Tamilnet news website. Further the government spokesmen has said that he is looking to hire hackers to disable Tamilnet . Tamilnet has been producing news about the Sri lankan civil war focusing in the North and the East of the country. Tamilnet is regarded as a "Pro-rebel" website. 2122 Sweden Sweden 's major Internet service providers have a DNS filter which blocks access to sites authorities claim are known to provide child pornography, similar to Denmark's filter. The Swedish police are responsible for updating this list of forbidden Internet sites. On July 6, Swedish police said that there is material with Child Pornography available at the file-sharing site Pirate Bay and said it would be included in the list of forbidden Internet sites. This, however, did not happen as the police claimed the illegal material had been removed from the site. This came with criticism and accusations that the intended Pirate Bay censorship was political in nature, as Pirate Bay has been an embarrassing site for the Swedish government. Thailand Significant efforts have been made in Thailand to oppose sites that are representing illegal activities. Activities such as gambling, drug usage and pornography are strictly banned, using DNS control in Thailand and, more effectively, a transparent proxy. This makes the website appear to be inaccessible. Also, the government has banned sites that discuss circumventing Internet censorship. Turkey Although there are no specific laws for Internet censorship in Turkish Penal Code, on March 6 , 2007 , the government of Turkey blocked access to the video-upload site; YouTube.com, with the following statement on the website; "Access to www.youtube.com site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/384 dated 06.03.2007 of Istanbul First Criminal Peace Court."23 The ban was met with widespread protests and lifted two days later. United Kingdom See Also: Internet Censorship in the United Kingdom British Telecommunications passes internet traffic through a service called Cleanfeed which uses data provided by the Internet Watch Foundation to identify pages believed to contain indecent photographs of children." IWF/BT Project CleanFeed ", Internet Watch Foundation. Retrieved 29 May 2006." How net providers stop child porn ", BBC News, 7 February 2006. Retrieved 29 May 2006. When such a page is found, the system creates a 'URL not found page' error rather than deliver the actual page or a warning page. In 2003, after the murder of 2004 . Retrieved 29 May 2006 . What the Government has termed " Extreme Pornography " could now become illegal to possess. 'Extreme' porn proposals spark row The government has begun to crack down on sites depicting rape, strangulation, torture and necrophilia." UK police seek web porn crackdown ", BBC News, 5 February 2004. Retrieved 29 May 2006." Crackdown due on violent web porn ", BBC News, 15 August 2005. Retrieved 29 May 2006. In Scotland, 2004, a committee of Members Of The Scottish Parliament has backed a call to ban adult pornography as the Equal Opportunities Committee supported a petition claiming links between porn and sexual crimes and violence against women and children." MSPs back pornography ban calls ", BBC News, 2 November 2004. Retrieved 29 May 2006. A spokeswoman said "While we have no plans to legislate we will, of course, continue to monitor the situation." United Kingdom, the new Home Office Minister Vernon Coaker set a deadline of the end of 2007 for all ISPs to implement a " Cleanfeed "-style network level content-blocking platform. Currently, the only web sites ISPs are expected to block access to are sites the Internet Watch Foundation has identified as containing images of child abuse. However such a platform is capable of blocking access to any web site added to the list (at least, to the extent that the implementation is effective), making it a simple matter to change this policy in future. The Home Office has previously indicated that it has considered requiring ISPs to block access to articles on the web deemed to be "glorifying terrorism", within the meaning of the new Terrorism Act 2006 (UK) Government sets deadline for universal network-level content blocking . United States of America See Also: Internet censorship in the United States The . Opponents of Internet censorship argue that the free speech provisions of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution bars the government from any law or regulation that censors the Internet. Internet Censorship: United States v. American Library Association A January 4 , 2007 Restraining Order issued by U.S. District Court Judge Jack B. Weinstein forbade a large number of activists in the Psychiatric Survivors Movement from posting links on their websites to ostensibly leaked documents which purportedly show that Eli Lilly And Company intentionally withheld information as to the lethal side-effects of Zyprexa . The Electronic Frontier Foundation is currently appealing this Prior Restraint on the right to link to and post documents, claiming that citizen-journalists should have the same First Amendment rights as major media outlets Eli Lilly Zyprexa Litigation . The Department Of Defense filters certain IP Address es. It is common for a user of a Department of Defense-owned computer to see this warning when attempting to access an inappropriate webpage;
The justification for this is Army Regulation 25-1 (PDF) . PORTAL CENSORSHIP Major portals occasionally exclude web sites that they would ordinarily include. This renders a site invisible to people who do not know where to find it. When a major portal does this, it has a similar effect as censorship. Sometimes this exclusion is done to satisfy a legal or other requirement, other times it is purely at the discretion of the portal. Examples
Major web portal official statements on site removal
BY ONLINE COMMUNITIES Forums and Chatrooms frequently have Moderators , who will edit or remove material against the rules of that community. The scope of these rules varies from community to community - some will want material to be suitable for a specific audience, whilst others only require discussions to be kept within the law. Many USENET groups are unmoderated. Wikipedia has also been accused of censorship.24See: COMMONLY TARGETED WEBSITES
CIRCUMVENTION There are a number of resources that allow users to bypass the technical aspects of Internet censorship. Each solution has differing ease of use, speed, and security from other options. Proxy websites See Also: Proxy server Proxy websites are often the simplest and fastest way to access banned websites in censored nations. Such websites work by being themselves un-banned but capable of displaying banned material within them. This is usually accomplished by entering a URL address which the proxy website will fetch and display. Java Anon Proxy Java Anon Proxy is primarily a strong, free and Open Source anonymizer software available for all operating systems. As Of 2004 , it also includes a blocking resistance functionality that allows users to circumvent the blocking of the underlying anonymity service AN.ON by accessing it via other users of the software (forwarding client). The addresses of JAP users that provide a forwarding server can be retrieved by getting contact to AN.ON's InfoService network, either automatically or, if this network is blocked, too, by writing an e-mail to one of these InfoServices. The JAP software automatically decrypts the answer after the user did a CAPTCHA . The developers are currently planning to integrate additional and even stronger blocking resistance functions. Psiphon Psiphon software allows users in nations with censored Internet such as China to accessed banned websites like Wikipedia . The service requires that the software be installed on a computer with uncensored access to the Internet so that the computer can act as a proxy for users in censored environments. Tor Tor is a Free Software implementation that allows users to bypass Internet censorship while granting strong anonymity (though it has its Weaknesses ). Sneakernets , 2007 . The charity relief organization Information Without Borders is attempting to implement a sneakernet routing protocol for providing cheap Internet access to developing and post-conflict regions using donated PDAs and mobile phones, and also for providing free and open Internet access to repressive regimes that restrict free expression by limiting access. Sneakernet email network diagrams from IWB SEE ALSO
EXTERNAL LINKS Campaigns against
Circumvention resources
REFERENCES |
|
|