inkbluesky

Internet Censorship

Some censorship is legal, not technical. Countries have laws against publishing certain content, registration requirements that prevent anonymous Internet use, liability laws that force Internet service providers to filter themselves, or surveillance. Egypt does not engage in technical Internet filtering; instead, its laws discourage the publishing and reading of certain content — it has even jailed people for their online activities.

The second half of Access Denied consists of detailed descriptions of Internet use, regulations and censorship in eight regions of the world, and in each of 40 different countries. The ONI found evidence of censorship in 26 of those 40. For the other 14 countries, it summarizes the legal and regulatory framework surrounding Internet use, and tests the results that indicated no censorship. This leads to 200 pages of rather dry reading, but it is vitally important to have this information well-documented and easily accessible. The book’s data are from 2006, but the authors promise frequent updates on the ONI website.

Schneier highlights the statements of cyberlibertarian John Perry Barlow who as recently as 1996 ( I know eons in net time) who claimed that governments couldn’t effectively censor the net if they wanted to. Unfortunately Mr. Barlow has been proved wrong. Censorship strickly speaking is a government enterprise and they certainly have the power. If your family, college or work censor your net usage you might have a valid moral  issue, but not automatically a legal one. A gray area that is becoming darker is government’s assistance to ISPs in the form of ending net neutrality. Not much of a surprise, Senators Clinton and Obama are pro neutrality/pro users as are organizations like the Christian Coalition of America and the American Civil Liberties Union. While Senator McCain  has used the kind of politi-speak we’ve all come to know and love,  “When you control the pipe, you should be able to get profit from your investment.” – so if money is the issue the Senator would agree that consumer’s money is just  as valuable as any ISPs. Anyone had any dealings with their ISP over billing or other issues? Do we really want those same people deciding how much bandwidth we get from this or that site or which sites should be blocked for whatever reason the ISP has on their PowerPoint slide that day.

They mean well and all, but this building looks like a giant version of one of those plastic things they sell on TV for growing herbs, Eco-Tower: Michael Jantzen’s Eco-creation with a modern twist to it!

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