Human Rights and a Code of Conduct for China's Web

Ian Lamont writes "Human Rights Watch is preparing a code of conduct that specifies how major Internet service providers and portal operators should deal with Internet censorship in China. An officer for the group expressed concern that the Chinese government is 'setting the standard on control of the Internet' and also singled out international companies working in China for preemptively blocking access in 'anticipation of requests from the government' rather than waiting for orders from Beijing to block access. China has recently blocked YouTube following the posting of videos about the Tibetan protests, but has been unable to completely stop the flow of Tibet-related information in and out of China, thanks in part to bloggers and others using spam tactics to bypass Chinese filters."

Comments

Olympic response

[esocid]

The code is due in the next couple of months and comes in the run up to the Beijing Olympic Games that begin in August.

I am interested in what will happen when the Olympics go the China and the press/visitors/athletes respond to the censorship there. I doubt it would change anything automatically but no doubt will put some pressure on the government since it will be under the scrutiny of the entire world.

Instead of a "code of conduct" for the ISPs

[iminplaya]

Let's create a workaround and eliminate the need for for them entirely. That would be much more likely to bring about the desired result.