Slashdot Mirror
Web Censorship on the Increase
mid-devonian writes "Close on the heels of the temporary blocking of YouTube by a Turkish judge, a group of academics has published research showing that Web censorship is on the increase worldwide. As many as two dozen countries are blocking content using a variety of techniques. Distressingly, the most censor-heavy countries (which includes China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Burma and Uzbekistan) seem to be passing on their technologically sophisticated techniques to other areas of the world. 'New censorship techniques include the periodic barring of complete applications, such as China's block on Wikipedia or Pakistan's ban on Google's blogging service, and the use of more advanced technologies such as 'keyword filtering', which is used to track down material by identifying sensitive words.'"
let us hope this doesn't spread- Fahrenheit 451 on the web
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Xxxx xxx xxxx? xxxx x xx x xx xx xxx xx! xxxx xxx ...
xxxx xxxx Xxxxxxxx!
xxx... xxx!
XX XXX XXX XXXX XXXXX!!!!!!X!X!X!XXX
and the use of more advanced technologies such as 'keyword filtering', which is used to track down material by identifying sensitive words.
As the FCC has found out, people will just make up new words, that are worse than the old words. Like "Blumpkin".
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
...in America, you can use the internet however you like, right? http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/03/15/145221 4
Whore Yourself... @ http://whorapedia.com/
I was just reading about *CENSORED* on the *CENSORED*, when all of a sudden some guys *CENSORED* into my apartment and started *CENSORED* my stuff and *CENSORED* my wife.
'Loose' is when your pants are three sizes too big. 'Lose' is when you misuse 'loose'.
We must protect the people from the harm caused by this new axis of evil.
Just try and search for them, I dare you!
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Government, please stay off of the Internet. Freedom of speech involves some risk. Let the people choose if they take that risk or not, but if you take it from us, you take our freedom as well.
http://bgcommonsense.blogspot.com
You can't protect society without controlling society. You can't control society without controlling information. In the land of ignorance, the informed man is king. True democracies don't have kings. Information is communism. Ignorance is patriotic. Oh shit, American Idol is on -- gotta go!
web searches you?
http://www.coderoshi.com/
As a citizen of the People's Republic of China, I can only see this as good news. It is heartening to see that the people of the world are outgrowing their childish attachment to outdated notions like "freedom" and "individualism" and realizing that future progress of humanity depends on subordination of individual drives to the good of harmonious society and beneficial development of the motherland.
At this time in history, people all over the world are waking up to the damage that capitalism and "Democracy" have brought to the world. America and Europe and their nineteenth-century ideas of "rights" and "freedom" have brought little else but war, genocide, terrorism, environmental devastation, immoral depravity, exploitation, and chaos.
Small wonder that a recent Beijing Star poll shows that People's Republic of China is the most respected nation on earth. We move forward together harmoniously into twenty-first century, the century of Communism.
Only 4 comments so far on the topic of censorship on slashdot? Damn, it's too late someone much have censored slashdot from most businesses! Oh, no, think of the productivity gains that just made.
It's too bad we didn't turn the Internet over to the UN like you guys all wanted...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Look into the freedom of speech (and press, and related) laws in the countries mentioned in TFA. Those are countries which prohibit (at least some forms of) government protesting, restrict television airwaves, and are generally unfriendly in the freedom of information department anyway. Why should the internet be any different?
Web censorship is not something that only happens halfway around the world in countries like Uzkbekistan and Burma. If you're from the UK, meet Cleanfeed, a soon-to-be compulsory system for blocking "illegal" content. Only a select group of secretive internet wizards know how it works, and a circle of elders living deep in the mountains are in charge of deciding exactly what is and isn't "illegal content". Not everybody runs it just yet, but its effects are already being felt.
Apparently, the government here is also known to block blogs and such that are critical of the king, as well as other sites that may be considered "unfriendly" to Morocco. However, in my surfing I have not come across any sites that have been blocked, but then again, I am mostly looking for news and information about other parts of the world, so I guess the sites I frequent aren't worth blocking.
"Empathise with stupidity, and you're halfway to thinking like an idiot." - Iain M. Banks
More people than ever are using the internet. This just in: more internet users than ever are censored.
Should we be surprised here? I'm not.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
The U.S. is like the slutty girl down the street that nobodys mom wants them talking to.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
Whenever I read words like "on the Increase" (as well as "corroded", "falling apart", "rapidly dwindling", etc.) I automatically wonder if I am being presented with "Saturday Night Live Syndrome", where people pull out the popular opinion that Saturday Night Live just isn't as good as it used to be.
The report seems to cover 13 countries, none of which are exactly bastions of civil liberties. Only Thailand and Turkey are countries that even have a medium record of civil rights. I think the fact that people in Uzbekistan can't access sites critical of their government is both one of the smaller concerns of both the internet, and of the civil rights of Uzbekistan's citizens.
If more countries that actually had long-standing traditions of free speech, or emerging traditions of free speech, were suffering censorship, that might be a story. But as it is, this hardly seems like dramatic news.
Hopefully I didn't put any [] around my words.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
"Distressingly, the most censor-heavy countries (which includes China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Burma and Uzbekistan) seem to be passing on their technologically sophisticated techniques to other areas of the world. "
Hey, information wants to be free!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Listen everyone: Censorship is a fact of life. You may not like the way some do it; but we all do it, and most think their kind of censorship is just fine.
No matter whether we think we believe in Freedom and all that, we all know that there has to be limits to what can be said. It is generally accepted that 'Freedom of Speech' doea not allow us to perpetrate crimes on the net - such as soliciting child pornography or teaching how to fly passenger planes into tall buildings, just to mention a few. The question is where should the limit go - should we allow hardcore porn on websites that target children? No?
A very big factor in what one thinks is suitable is culture - have you ever seen those adverts for HSBC (an international bank)? They are all about how some things are different in different countries (and how important local knowledge is); like eg. that showing your bare feet may be fine in USA or Australia, but is considered extremely rude in Thailand. What I am saying here is: You and I don't necessarily know what is an absolute no-no in other countries, and we should not be too hasty in condemning what other countries choose is not acceptable on the Net. Filtering in China is after all not denying Americans access to things they feel are OK.
On the other hand, I fully understand and respect that there are certain things that should never be censored - but I don't think freedom of speech as a fundamental right is something you can use as an excuse for not being able to show a bit of cultural sensitivity. One of the main reasons that freedom of speech is important is that democracy doesn't work without it - people must have the right to know all there is to know about the decision they make when they vote; it is not primarily there to ensure that everybody can pour all kinds of tripe out in the public space.