Siemens, Nokia Helped Provide Iran's Censoring Tech

An anonymous reader writes "The Wall Street Journal has an article about Nokia and Siemens selling the censoring technology to Iran's government. Do you believe that the public relations damage to these companies can persuade them from selling this kind of technology to other dictatorial regimes?" I don't believe there will *be* any PR Damage, and that makes me a little sad.

Comments

Let Their Big Friend in the Sky Help Them

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone who professes to that an imaginary being is responsible for everything is insane and doesn't deserve any benefit of science. Jonas Salk, Louis Pasteur, Thomas Edison, Galileo Galilei, and the other great minds have saved more souls and advanced humanity further than any Mullah, Pastor, or Priest of any faith. The Mad Mullahs of Iran don't deserve cell phones or any other bit of technology.
Yeah, it's a rant, but I'm just tired of religious nut jobs of any type forcing their superstitions on anyone else.

Like the Nazis

[slimjim8094]

It just occured to me that I Godwin'd this story already, but this is just like when IBM sold adding machines to the Nazis to help them tabulate Holocaust victims.

Way I see it, who cares? The corner store selling smokes isn't to blame for the lung cancer - ultimately the smoker is. Except it's even more generic than that.

- Siemens sold network technology to Iran - the same you'd use for all sorts of network admin - and they used it to censor. That's Iran's bad.
- IBM sold adding machines - they'll count anything - and the Nazis used them to count Jews (and others). That's the Nazi's bad.

In short, don't blame the maker for the use of the tool.

Re:Like the Nazis

[Comatose51]

I was going to advocate the same position in my own reply until I realized that taken to the extreme, this position has some problems. If we say that the tool makers are always guilt free, then companies should be able to sell nuclear weapons or parts for one to anyone they like. Fine. Then what happens when those weapons are used? We can argue that the companies are blameless still and ultimately the guilty part is the country that chose to use the weapons. At that point, who cares about moralistic arguments? If millions of people died because a company sold the tools necessary to do that, the company is going to ripped to pieces. Furthermore, is it right for a company to sell the tools to someone if it knew the tools would be used for something bad? I don't think it is. I guess my point is that whether a company is guilty or not depends a lot on whether it knew or could have know that its actions will lead to bad consequences. It's not fair to blame someone for something that couldn't have been foreseen. However, purposely enabling an evil deed is another story.

Re:Surprise surprise

[pirhana]

Iran, regardless of all the shortcomings and issues IS a democracy. Most of the other countries in gulf region(Like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait) are under family dictatorships and worse tyrannies. And US/EU governments and corporations sell everything including weapons to them. I think this is far worse than selling technology to Iran.

Party Talk

[AB3A]

"...so, what do you do?"

"I sell net censoring software."

"Really? Who buys that stuff?"

"Oh, lots of people. We have ISP customers from around the world."

"What do they use it for?"

"You know, censoring kiddie porn sites, blocking mail spammers, and so on." ...

I think that's a pretty good description of what this is about. People are selling tools. The problem is how those tools are used. There are evil shit-heads all over the world. That does not mean the tools themselves are evil.

Re:Remember South African apartheid?

[Chuck Chunder]

South Africa is a good example of the western world wielding sanctions (economic and otherwise) for good effect but I think it's worth considering the differences between Iran and South Africa.

The South African ruling classes valued their place in the western world and it hurt them to lose that relationship. I'm not sure the same can be said of Iran, I think a large proportion of them would be quite happy to have the west as an enemy they can blame for their woes, there is no good relationship to be lost, only the ability to make everyday Iranians poorer.

As far as Nokia and Siemens goes I think it's also worth thinking about how their technology is also empowering everyday Iranians. No doubt some of the footage and messages being passed around in recent days comes from Nokia/Siemens equipment. I'd bet their overall effect is a net benefit in terms of freedom so asking them to avoid selling anything to the country would be a mistake.

Information technology will empower the Iranian people no matter how many barriers the Iranian government may hope to put up more and more stuff will leak through. I agree that we should pressure companies to stay clear of ethically dubious things the government there does but avoiding the country entirely would be a mistake.

Re:Surprise surprise

[Ronald Dumsfeld]

Thats because western media are showing a very biased story of the Iran issues. Were the western reporters and observers able to see any solid evidence of rigging the election ? I doubt. The reason Nejad won the election with such a huge margin is because of his popularity among rural mass. The so called "reformist's" influence is confined to Tehran and surrounding areas only.

Catch up to today's events. The Guardian Council has had to admit that in 50 cities there were more votes cast than people eligible to vote. Other sources say the figure may be as high as 120 cities and 110% of the total electorate.

All to elect a puppet. Yes, a puppet. The power remains with the clerics, they decide who are acceptable candidates after making it quite clear what boundaries are acceptable for those seeking the position.