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During the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been many economic and political measures. One of the most unfortunate ones is censorship of the Internet.

NetBlocks, a civil society group working at the intersection of digital rights, cyber-security and internet governance, reported on strange Internet outages in Wuhan during certain nights when the COVID-19 epidemic was starting to gather steam. The Farsi version ofWikipedia was blocked for about 24 hours in Iran.

VPN company Surfshark reported that its VPN infrastructure in Iran was seeing a dropoff of 50% in connection rate after the WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic on March 13th. Their cybersecurity advisor Naomi Hedges claims that since 13 March - when [COVID-19] was labeled as a pandemic - Surfshark's connection rates inIranhave dropped by 50%. Meanwhile, our website traffic fromIranhas decreased fivefold of its usual rate. Before the announcement, we haven't experienced notable fluctuations inIran's connectivity rates, so the numbers indicate the increased attempts to censor the internet.

It comes amid reports that China too is clamping on access to the Internet outside the Great Firewall, with VPN providers and connections under strain. Chinese social media networks such as WeChat have also been reported to have censored COVID-19 related terms since December 31st in a notable incident, Dr. Li Wenliang was censured by the Wuhan police for posting about COVID-19 in a private WeChat group.

This is a threat that many cryptocurrency and Bitcoin advocates are aware of. The Internet itself is a protocol Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies depend on in order to communicate data. If the Internet is shut down or content within it is filtered/blocked, peers within a certain country would not be able to communicate with one another effectively.

If content is being censored or tracked, cryptocurrency miners and peers within a country could see their connectivity attempts to the global network be denied, effectively shuttering their ability to transact and to get the global status of the Bitcoin network.

Its why Blockstream has tried to diversify away Bitcoin from its dependency on an uncensored Internet by launching a satellite network that broadcasts data from the Bitcoin blockchain and any other data people choose to pay to upload through the Lightning Network.

This makes the cost of censoring Bitcoin and other information more expensive: nation-states go from needing to cut off domestic broadband communications to having to deploy kinetic force in space an option few countries have access to, and which would be politically unenvious even for the boldest of political leaders.

Beyond just the blunt question of on/off censorship however, cryptocurrencies and their relationship to the Internet at large pose interesting dilemmas. As central banks look more and more at digitizing their currencies and the legal attitude towards digital privacy is being redefined by COVID-19, broad changes may threaten

Centralized digital currencies will have access to lots of metadata associated per each account, including possible location data, that can be tracked and compiled.

This may be necessary in a pandemic, but in general, governments who gain hard-fought emergency powers are loath to return them. The post-9/11 period saw a spate of renewals of the authorization of military force and Patriot Act, stretched to give cover to different government powers until reform only came more than a decade later. This fact led Edward Snowden to warn that temporary surveillance powers may well outlast the COVID-19 pandemic.

As governments look to respond to COVID-19, some will look to censor the Internet and some will look to use digital tools to track their population during the crisis period, perhaps with long-lasting consequences. Both have the potential for abuse, and both pose different but ever-present threats for cryptocurrencies and our liberty at large.

Read more here:

Internet Censorship During COVID-19 Is Threat To Cryptocurrencies And Liberty - Forbes

The coronavirus pandemic has caused governments all over the world to introduce drastic emergency measures, suspending many of the freedoms that citizens normally take for granted. Many of these measures are necessary in order to save lives. To flatten the curve through social distancing, we must be willing to sacrifice certain liberties for the safety of our colleagues, friends, and family.

However, an increasing number of governments are also using the current health emergency to suppress criticism and undesirable information through the proliferation of laws against disinformation. Free speech advocates have long warned against so-called fake news bans, fearing that they would prove to be, at best, a well-intended but ill-conceived effort to address a real problem and, at worst, another weapon in the authoritarians arsenal. Examples abound of these laws applied as a weapon against critics and dissidents, rather than a balm for misinformation. In countries such as Egypt and Singapore, applications of fake news restrictions have led to troubling prosecutions oflawyers,anti-harassment activists,opposition politicians, andwatchdog groups.

The current coronavirus outbreak has undoubtedly resulted in the viral spread of misinformation, a veritable infodemic that poses a challenge to containment efforts. Yet the fears that fake news laws are an antidote whose side effects may be worse than the disease are being borne out. Across the globe, illiberal leadersfacing questions about their preparedness to deal with a pandemic that has killed nearly 45,000 people, at a time when too few states appear to be equipped for the challengesee fake news bans as convenient tools to suppress criticism and accurate information just as readily as misinformation.

In Cambodia,Human Rights Watch foundthat at least 17 people have been arrested on fake news charges for comments they made about the coronavirus. The detainees include four members or supporters of the dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), all of whom remain in pretrial detention, as well as a teenage girl who was arrested and subjected to police questioning about her social media posts expressing fear about potential positive diagnoses in her area.

[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic and learn how its affecting countries around the world.]

In Thailand, aman was arrestedafter complaining on Facebook about a lack of preventative measures at Bangkoks Suvarnabhumi Airport. He wrote that the airport did not enforce any coronavirus screening against him or his fellow passengers returning from Barcelona, even though Spain now has more coronavirus cases than China, the original epicenter. His arrest is part of a larger effort to crack down on alleged misinformation, which happens to include criticism of Thailands response to the outbreak. These efforts include threats of lawsuits, firings, and punishment against journalists and medical staff who have pointed out the strain that the coronavirus is placing on the countrys public health system.

Turkey has unfortunately become infamous for its suppression of criticism under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. So its unsurprising that, as of a March 16report, authorities had identified at least 93 suspects allegedly responsible for unfounded and provocative social media comments about the coronavirus, and they had arrested 19 of them. Reuterswritesthat the Turkish interior ministry was acting to arrest social media users whose posts were targeting officials and spreading panic and fear by suggesting that the virus had spread widely in Turkey and that officials had taken insufficient measures. But, only 10 days later, the New York Timesreporteda marked surge in Turkish coronavirus cases, outstripping rates in most other countries. While this is obviously politically inconvenient for the Turkish government, it might not be false, then, to suggest that Turkey, like the United States, Italy, and Spain, is insufficiently prepared for the threat of the coronavirus.

A number of other authoritarian and illiberal states such as Egypt, Azerbaijan, Russia, Iran, the Philippines, Honduras, and Singapore are taking similar steps byharassing journalists,adopting new lawsspecifically aimed at suppressing fake news, or using existing onesto targetundesirable content on social media.

A new podcast from Foreign Policy covering all aspects of the coronavirus pandemic

However, even countries formally committed to democracy have been infected with the irresistible urge to fight the coronavirus with censorship. On its officialhome page,the South African government warns: Anyone that creates or spreads fake news about the Coronavirus COVID-19 is liable for prosecution. In Indias Himachal Pradesh state, a journalist was arrested on charges of spreading fake news about COVID-19 on social media.

And in Hungary, where democracy has long been in decline under the illiberal government of Prime MinisterViktor Orban, the coronavirus outbreak has offered Orban another opportunity to cement and drastically expand his authority. On March 30, the countrys parliament passedan emergency bill that gives Orban sweeping powers to rule by decree, without a clear cut-off date, according to the Guardian. One terrifying provision of the law? Theintroductionof prison terms of up to five years for anyone publicising false information that alarms the public or impedes government efforts to protect people, the Guardian reports. This bill, with its vague and broad definitions, is a gift to a proven authoritarian who has already made clear his distaste for journalists and critics.

The censorship bug has spread to social media platforms themselves. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter walk a tight line between ensuring the spread of vital information to affected populations and limiting the virality of potentially harmful disinformationsome of it state-sponsored. But due to lockdown measures, the use of automated content moderation has increased on social media platforms where algorithms, rather than humans, have removed well-researched journalistic coronavirus stories from media outlets including the Atlantic and the New York Times. This unintended consequence vividly demonstrates the dangers of erring on the side of censorship in times of even real emergencies.

Its true that many social media postsand even government statementsabout the coronavirus have been unwittingly inaccurate or, worse, intentionally false and intended to spread panic or bigotry. All may be deserving of responses, whether to ensure dangerous medical disinformation is countered with facts or to show support for groups that have been targeted with racist rhetoric. But fake news bans, and the harm they inflict upon civil society and aid they provide to authoritarians, are too tough a pill to swallow.

At a time when information and transparency are necessary to combat this pandemic, it is vital that government-led censorship be identified, exposed, and rejected. The devastating effects of censorship during Chinas initial outbreak make this clear. Had China not engaged in censorship of information it claimed to be false in nearly every step of the outbreakthreatening or silencingdoctors, whistleblowers, journalists, and social media usersits possible that its citizens wouldve been more prepared and taken better precautions that wouldve limited the spread. (This, of course, does not absolve such leaders as U.S. President Donald Trump who are responsible for their own failures to sufficiently prepare for the outbreak or warn their citizens about its dangers.)

The idea that governments should tolerate even false and misleading information is deeply counterintuitive at a time when people around the world are desperate for certainty and reliable information about an outbreak threatening millions of lives. In such times it is tempting to demand prompt and urgent action to combat those who undermine national and global efforts through disinformation. However, the feedback loop of informationmuch of which will be unreliable or wrongis critical in efforts to identify the most efficient responses and communicate them to the public.

Harsh and unprecedented measures are needed to combat the coronavirus. But censorship is not part of the cure, and the more authoritarians use it, the more well see that its a symptom of another disease.

Read more:

The Coronavirus Has Started a Censorship Pandemic in Turkey, Hungary, Thailand, and Around the World - Foreign Policy

Every day new initiatives are being announced to ensure people have the correct information on the COVID-19 pandemic, but who watches the watchers?

The BBC reported today that the UK government is cracking down on misinformation about the coronavirus pandemic. This is taking the form of a rapid response unit within the Cabinet Office [that] is working with social media firms to remove fake news and harmful content. As ever harmful is undefined, but the government seems worried that people could die as a result of being misinformed.

Meanwhile an initiative started by the BBC, among others, called the Trusted News Initiative, has announced plans to tackle potentially harmful coronavirus disinformation. Most things are potentially harmful, surely, and theres something distinctly sinister about an organisation designating itself trusted. Surely thats for other people to decide.

During emergencies of this magnitude, the need for trusted, factual, evidence-based reporting is more crucial than ever, said Noel Curran, Director-General of the European Broadcasting Union, which calls itself the worlds leading alliance of public service media and is a member of the TNI.

Yet there is a tide of misinformation and bad information, driven mainly through online social platforms, which is threatening to undermine public trust and cause further anxiety for people. This initiative underlines the role of public service media in tackling misinformation head-on and delivering accurate content that audiences can safely rely on.

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are all members of the TNI too and on top of this, they seem to be constantly rolling out initiatives of their own. Last week Nick Clegg, Facebooks VP of Global Affairs and Communications wrote about what the company is doing to ensure purity of information across all its platforms.

The most untainted source of COVID-19 information, according to Clegg, is the World Health Organization. So Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp are now all spamming their users with top tips from the WHO, in many cases whether they like it or not. Until recently not many people would have contested claim that the WHO is the ultimate global authority on such matters the clue is in the name, right? but the tendency of its senior leadership to overtly kowtow to China, as in the clip below, is undermining trust in it.

Speaking of Twitter, it seems to be taking a strong position on the matter of hydroxychloroquine, an antimalarial drug that also seems to have at least some positive medical effect on COVID-19. Twitter apparently doesnt like people bigging the drug up too much on its platform, even going so far as to take down posts from President Trumps Lawyer, Rudy Giuliani and the President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, for extolling its virtues.

However, as Axios points out, Twitter is inconsistent in its implementation of this new rule, having recently permitted a tweet of clear misinformation from tech entrepreneur Elon Musk to stay up. This highlights the problem with this latest attempt at censorship, one shared with all others. The censorship decisions ultimately have to be made by humans and will therefore always be flawed.

Until recently very few people expected Twitter to be expert on the therapeutic qualities of hydroxychloroquine, yet now we do. Meanwhile Facebook has unilaterally anointed the WHO the Oracle of Healthy, despite its refusal to acknowledge Taiwan and many questions about its effectiveness in mitigating the catastrophe the world is now having to endure.

As for trusted sources, how much of the mainstream media can really be trusted? Very few publications dont have some kind of bias, with the US especially egregious in that respect. If President Trump suggested a new course of action, how sure can we be that CNN or the New York Times wouldnt dismiss it out of hand or that Fox News would subject it to proper scrutiny?

The thing is, Journalists are human too and no less prone to biases and prejudices than anyone else. At Telecoms.com we never expect our audience to unquestioningly accept everything we say and encourage stress-testing of our stories by investigating what else has been written on the matter. In fact, the more trusted a source of information claims to be, the more we would urge you to seek a second opinion.

As we have said previously, censorship is at best a game of whack-a-mole because you cant perfect speech. You cant have good speech without bad speech and attempts to eradicate the latter lead to no speech at all, at least none that you can hear in public. In practice censorship just drives banned speech underground, where it gains prominence and is subject to far less scrutiny.

There is currently an abundance of official information on the coronavirus pandemic, meaning supposed misinformation can easily be fact-checked by anyone with an internet connection. Nothing can be done about those who choose not to and attempting to protect such people from themselves through blanket censorship and culling of information sources is both futile and repressive.

The rest is here:

Social media censorship in the time of coronavirus - Telecoms.com

It is 40 years since Howard Brentons play The Romans in Britain, directed by Michael Bogdanov, opened at Londons National Theatre. Set in ancient Rome, it deals with themes of imperialism and abuse of power, and became infamous for a brief episode in its first act when actors Peter Sproule and Greg Hicks portrayed an act of male rape.

The play made legal and political history when morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse tried to prosecute Bogdanov using the Sexual Offences Act 1956, alleging that he had procured an act of gross indecency between two men by directing the two actors.

The controversy reflected the cultural wars of the time. Thirteen years before the play had opened, the Sexual Offences Act 1967 decriminalised homosexual acts in private between two men. Yet as Geoffrey Robertson QC, who was a junior barrister for the defence, says, the attitude of the law was that it was not to be encouraged or legitimised.

Theatre censorship became less common after the Theatres Act abolished the lord chamberlains historic role of censor in 1968, but homophobic attitudes were still the norm. In 1976, Whitehouse, described by Robertson as the self-appointed conscience of the nation, sent her solicitor Graham Ross-Cornes to see The Romans in Britain, and then sought to bring her case.

The director of public prosecutions, Thomas Hetherington, advised the attorney general, Michael Havers, that the play did not contravene the Theatres Act. So Whitehouse tried another route and sought to prosecute Bogdanov under the Sexual Offences Act 1956. The legislation was designed to prevent men soliciting in public lavatories which is why, according to Robertson, the prosecution treated the National Theatre as a large public toilet.

Defence barrister Jeremy Hutchinson compiled a list of actors who were willing to give evidence for Bogdanov, while the prosecution only planned to call Ross-Cornes.

His evidence in the trial at the Old Bailey, Robertson says, prompted one of the most amazing piece of cross-examination ever heard. Giving his evidence, Ross-Cornes had not said where in the theatre he had been sitting.

Barristers are reluctant ever to ask a question in court to which they do not know the answer, and Hutchinson had to be persuaded to ask Ross-Cornes to mark on a map of the theatre where he had watched the production from.

The plan came back showing he had been sitting in the back row of the upper circle, 90 yards from the action. This exchange followed:

Hutchinson: You know that theatre is the art of illusion?

Ross-Cornes: If you say so, Lord Hutchinson.

Hutchinson: And as part of that illusion actors use physical gestures to convey impressions to an audience?

Ross-Cornes: Yes, I would accept that.

Hutchinson: And from the back row, 90 yards from the stage, you can be certain that what you saw was the tip of the actors penis?

Ross-Cornes: Well, if you put it that way, I cant be absolutely certain. But what else could it have been?

At this point Hutchinson balled up his fist, placed his hand by his groin and his gown over his hand, stuck out his thumb and made a thrusting action. He then asked: Are you sure you did not see the tip of the actors thumb? Ross-Corness subsequent admission that he might have been mistaken halted the trial.

As Robertson says, the case put an end to Whitehouses courtroom crusades. Gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell, meanwhile, says the cases impact went beyond the play itself: The failure of the prosecution was a huge victory, not just for LGBT+ people and the theatre world, but also against censorship and for liberal Britain. It struck a blow for gay visibility, against the homophobes and puritans.

But Lord Michael Cashman, the actor who played Colin Russell on Eastenders and portrayed the first ever gay kiss in a UK soap opera, says: The case was a very clear indicator that homosexuality would not even be tolerated, let alone expressed on a theatre stage.

He is unsure that the case accelerated the campaign for equality but says it was a vivid reminder that our rights were non-existent.

He says the support that the defence received from senior figures across the creative industries was heartening and encouraging, but adds: It must be remembered that they were defending not particularly homosexual issues but the right to artistic independence, as well as challenging the notion of censorship via the imposition of anothers perspective on morality.

See the article here:

Landmarks in law: the controversial 80s play that defied gay censorship - The Guardian

An increasing number of governments - including Turkey - are using emergency measures to deal with the coronavirus pandemic to suppress criticism and undesirable information, said analysts writing in the magazine Foreign Policy.

Many freedoms that citizens take for granted have been suspended in order to save lives during the pandemic, and misinformation poses a challenge to containment of the virus. But the proliferation of laws and censorship against supposed fake news, or disinformation, in countries such as Turkey, Egypt, and Singapore has led to troubling prosecutions and harassment of lawyers, anti-harassment activists, opposition politicians, and watchdog groups, said FP on Wednesday.

Across the globe, illiberal leaders - facing questions about their preparedness to deal with a pandemic that has killed nearly 45,000 people, at a time when too few states appear to be equipped for the challenge - see fake news bans as convenient tools to suppress criticism and accurate information just as readily as misinformation, said FP.

The FP said that, as Turkey has become infamous for its suppression of criticism under the rule of President Recep Tayyip Erdoan, it is unsurprising that the authorities had identified at least 93 suspects allegedly responsible for unfounded and provocative social media comments about the coronavirus, and had arrested 19 of them.

The Turkish Interior Ministry has been arresting social media users whose posts were targeting officials and spreading panic and fear by suggesting that the virus had spread widely in Turkey and that officials had taken insufficient measures, said FP, citing a Reuters report.

But Turkey on Wednesday confirmed 63 new deaths of people who contracted the coronavirus, marking the second consecutive deadliest day in the battle against COVID-19.With the new numbers, the total number of coronavirus deaths in Turkey have reached 277, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said.

Another 2,148 people have tested positive for the deadly virus, raising the total number of COVID-19 cases in the country to 15,679, he added.

While this is obviously politically inconvenient for the Turkish government, it might not be false, then, to suggest that Turkey, like the United States, Italy, and Spain, is insufficiently prepared for the threat of the coronavirus, said the FP.

The FP also detailed a range of similar prosecutions and harassment under the guise of tacking disinformation in Cambodia, Thailand, Egypt, Azerbaijan, Russia, Iran, the Philippines, Honduras, Singapore, South Africa, India, and Hungary. Many social media platforms have also taken down well-researched coronavirus content.

The FP said that censorship in China by threatening or silencing doctors, whistleblowers, journalists, and social media users during the outbreak has demonstrated the harm in such an approachas its citizens would have been more prepared and taken better precautions to limit the spread of the virus.

At a time when information and transparency are necessary to combat this pandemic, it is vital that government-led censorship be identified, exposed, and rejected, said FP.

Link:

Turkey among several countries censoring their coronavirus critics - Ahval

In brief

The Bitcoin Core website is now reachable through the dark web, according to a statement on March 27. It will provide a greater level of resistance against censorship.

The Bitcoin Core website posts the latest updates to the open-source Bitcoin software. Bitcoin Core is maintained by a large group of developers.

The darknet or dark web is a part of the Internet that's hidden from Google. Image: Shutterstock.

After frequent requests, this site is now reachable as a Tor hidden service through an onion address, the post stated, adding, As well as adding another means of censorship resistance, a hidden service gives an alternative trust path that doesnt rely on certificate authorities nor DNS infrastructure.

Certificate authorities check that websites are genuine while the DNS infrastructure is what connects IP addresses to domain names, such as http://www.bitcoincore.org. By making the site accessible via the dark web, it becomes less reliant on these technologies.

The dark web is a segment of the Internet not indexed by traditional search engines. On the most basic level, this means that you cant find or visit a dark web site unless you know its exact URL-address. The dark web can be accessed via the Tor browser.

While the dark web is most commonly associated with illegal activities, such as buying and selling drugs, it can be used for legitimate reasons.

In October 2019, the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) made its website available to Tor users last October by providing a dark web copy. This made its content available in Vietnam, China and Iran, where it was being censored.

However, the dark web can be risky to use. As Decrypt reported last year, malicious actors have used the onion network to steal Bitcoin funds from unsuspecting users.

More:

Bitcoin Core shifts to dark web to resist censorship - Decrypt

In times of mortal strife, humans crave information more than ever, and its journalists responsibility to deliver it.

But what if that information is inaccurate, or could even kill people?

Thats the quandary journalists have found themselves in as they decide whether to cover President Donald J. Trumps press briefings live.

Some television networks have started cutting away from the briefings, saying the events are no more than campaign rallies, and that the president is spreading falsehoods that endanger the public.

If Trump is going to keep lying like he has been every day on stuff this important, we should, all of us, stop broadcasting it, MSNBCs Rachel Maddow tweeted. Honestly, its going to cost lives.

News decisions and ethical dilemmas arent simple, but withholding information from the public is inconsistent with journalistic norms, and while well-meaning, could actually cause more harm than good in the long run. Keeping the presidents statements from the public prevents the public from being able to evaluate his performance, for example.

The Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics, updated in 2014 during my term as president, states that the press must seek truth and report it, while also minimizing harm.

When the president of the United States speaks, it matters it is newsworthy, its history in the making. Relaying that event to the public as it plays out is critical for citizens, who can see and hear for themselves what their leader is saying, and evaluate the facts for themselves so that they may adequately self-govern.

Thats true even if leaders lie. Actually, its even more important when leaders lie.

Think of libertarian philosopher John Miltons plea for the free flow of information and end of censorship in 1600s England. Put it all out there and let people sort the lies from the truth, Milton urged: Let her and Falsehood grapple.

If a president spreads lies and disinformation, or minimizes health risks, then the electorate needs to know that to make informed decisions at the polls, perhaps to vote the person out to prevent future missteps.

Likewise, theres a chance the president could be correct in his representation of at least some of the facts.

Its not up to journalists to decide, but simply report what is said while providing additional context and facts that may or may not support what the president said.

Maddow is correct that journalists should not simply parrot information spoon fed by those in power to readers and viewers who might struggle to make sense of it in a vacuum. That is why its imperative journalists continuously challenge false and misleading statements, and trust the public to figure it out.

Those who would urge the medias censorship of the presidents speeches may feel they are protecting citizens from being duped, because they believe the average person cant distinguish fact from fiction. Communication scholars call this third-person effect, where we feel ourselves savvy enough to identify lies, but think other more vulnerable, gullible and impressionable minds cannot.

It is understandable why journalists would try to protect the public from lies. Thats the minimizing harm part in the SPJ code of ethics, which is critical in these times, when inaccurate information can put a persons health at risk or cause them to make a fatal decision.

So how do journalists report the days events while minimizing harm and tamping down the spread of disinformation? Perhaps this can be accomplished through techniques already in use during this unorthodox presidential period:

Report the press briefings live for all to see, while providing live commentary and fact-checking, as PolitiFact and others have done for live presidential debates.

Fact-check the president after his talks, through contextual stories that provide the public accurate information, in the media and through websites such as FactCheck.org.

Call intentional mistruths what they are: Lies. With this administration, journalists have become more willing to call intentional falsehoods lies, and that needs to continue, if not even more bluntly.

Develop a deep list of independent experts that can be on hand to counter misinformation as it is communicated.

Report transparently and openly, clearly identifying sources, providing supplemental documents online, and acknowledging limitations of information.

The coronavirus pandemic is a critical time for the nations health and its democracy. Now, more than ever, we need information. As humans, we crave knowing what is going on around us, a basic awareness instinct, as termed by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel in their foundational book, The Elements of Journalism.

Sometimes people dont even realize they need information until after they have lost it.

In his autobiography, the late Sen. John McCain wrote that upon his release after five years as a Vietnamese prisoner of war, the first thing he did when he got to a Philippines military base was order a steak dinner and stack of newspapers.

I wanted to know what was going on in the world, and I grasped anything I could find that might offer a little enlightenment, McCain wrote. The thing I missed most was information free, uncensored, undistorted, abundant information.

People arent dummies. They can decipher good information from bad, as long as they have all the facts at their disposal.

And journalists are the ones best positioned to deliver it.

[You need to understand the coronavirus pandemic, and we can help. Read our newsletter.]

Read more:

It's a bad idea for journalists to censor Trump instead, they can help the public identify what's true or false - The Conversation US

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Covid-19, the condition that first rose from a wet market in Wuhan, is now crippling a better part of the world. While China says that it is recovering and is returning to normalcy, it is worth noting that the country has time and again wiped evidence, manipulated the state media, and blatantly lied.

This has been the same way the country tackled the SARS outbreak hiding facts and silencing whistleblowers.

A leader of the WHO that recently visited China was in awe of the countrys miraculous recovery from the outbreak. I think the key learning from China is speed its all about the speed, said Dr. Bruce Aylward.

That has been true indeed. Whether it was building an emergency hospital in ten days or suppressing the news of the mysterious infection from December till January, the Chinese Communist Party was indeed swift.

Double your web browsing speed with today's sponsor. Get Brave.

Heres a brief account of all the activity that took place prior to China officially acknowledging the fact that it was hit with an epidemic disease:

First, the government workers and officials of Wuhan kept mum when several people were falling sick and suffered from a set of common symptoms. Not a single official divulged the dire situation to any media personnel within the country.

Secondly, by December 25, Dr. Lu Xiaohong, who first recognized that some catastrophic was about to occur, hesitated to speak up to the authorities or media persons.

In China, journalists and their sources face a harsh action for speaking up about any concerning happenings in the country.

Had it not been so risky, Lu would have revealed the facts to at least one media outlet, if not higher authorities, who should have probably made the news public.

MORE:Viral video shows Police in China arriving at womans door, telling her to delete coronavirus post

Finally, when a group of whistleblowers tried to make it public knowledge that there was an infection ravaging the masses, they were arrested on grounds of circulating false rumors.

Whats more, eight of these whistleblowers have passed away from coronavirus infection. Finally, by December 31, China broke its silence and intimated the WHO about the to-be pandemic.

Four days after China revealed the Coronavirus outbreak to the WHO, it ended up sequencing the virus, and yet again, chose not to reveal the information immediately. So despite sequencing the virus on January 5th, the information was not out till January 11th, when the first coronavirus-related death surfaced.

MORE:Dr. Li Wenliang, who was reprimanded for warning people of coronavirus on Weibo, has died

Now, despite publicly declaring the news of coronavirus infections, China went on to censor several keywords related to the outbreak on its highly controlled platform, WeChat.

According to an analysis by the University of South Hampton, it was revealed that China could have potentially manipulated the statistics of the number of coronavirus-infected people by as much as 67%.

The study estimates that by the end of February 2020 there was a total of 114, 325 COVID-19 cases in China. It shows that without non-pharmaceutical interventions such as early detection, isolation of cases, travel restrictions and cordon sanitaire the number of infected people would have been 67 times larger than that which actually occurred, reads an excerpt taken from the analysis.

MORE:China tells citizens to only share coronavirus news from state-run media, or face up to seven years in jail

The leading international NGO Reporters Without Borders also claims that Chinas lackadaisical attitude when it came to revealing the growth and spread of the Coronavirus could cost millions of lives around the globe.

Without the control and censorship imposed by the authorities, the Chinese media would have informed the public much earlier of the severity of the coronavirus epidemic, sparing thousands of lives and perhaps avoiding the current pandemic, argued the RSF.

Sadly, most social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are also blocked in China, meaning that the citizens cant even reach out to social media and share their angst with their fellow countrymen.

While tech-savvy individuals still browse the social media networks with the help of VPNs, they still remain silent about the surrounding happenings. Because in China, expressing dissent from the governments actions can end up causing costly repercussions.

Cut to a decade earlier, there was another epidemic, much like the coronavirus, that the Chinese government ended up successfully dealing with: The SARS pandemic.

China got away with manipulating the figures, consequences, and every possible detail of the epidemic; back then, the internet was still in its nascent stages, meaning that people did not have social media and other similar outlets to spread information.

While the WHO is simply blowing the trumpet of the Chinese government and its excellent measures in tackling the coronavirus outbreak, it must account for the blatant censorship and manipulation of the truth that takes place behind the scenes and the lives that it cost.

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The mounting human cost of Chinas coronavirus censorship - Reclaim The Net

As more and more U.S. schools and businesses shutter their doors, the rapidly evolving coronavirus pandemic is helping to expose societys dependencegood and badon the digital world.

Entire swaths of society, including classes we teach at American University, have moved online until the coast is clear. As vast segments of society are temporarily forced into isolation to achieve social distancing, the internet is their window into the world. Online social events like virtual happy hours foster a sense of connectedness amid social distancing. While the online world is often portrayed as a societal ill, this pandemic is a reminder of how much the digital world has to offer.

The pandemic also lays bare the many vulnerabilities created by societys dependence on the internet. These include the dangerous consequences of censorship, the constantly morphing spread of disinformation, supply chain vulnerabilities and the risks of weak cybersecurity.

1. Chinas censorship affects us all.

The global pandemic reminds us that even local censorship can have global ramifications. Chinas early suppression of coronavirus information likely contributed to what is now a worldwide pandemic. Had the doctor in Wuhan who spotted the outbreak been able to speak freely, public health authorities might have been able to do more to contain it early.

China is not alone. Much of the world lives in countries that impose controls on what can and cannot be said about their governments online. Such censorship is not just a free speech issue, but a public health issue as well. Technologies that circumvent censorship are increasingly a matter of life and death.

2. Disinformation online isnt just speechits also a matter of health and safety.

During a public health emergency, sharing accurate information rapidly is critical. Social media can be an effective tool for doing just that. But its also a source of disinformation and manipulation in ways that can threaten global health and personal safety something tech companies are desperately, yet imperfectly, trying to combat.

Facebook, for example, has banned ads selling face masks or promising false preventions or cures, while giving the World Health Organization unlimited ad space. Twitter is placing links to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other reliable information sources atop search returns. Meanwhile, Russia and others reportedly are spreading rumors about the coronaviruss origins. Others are using the coronavirus to spread racist vitriol, in ways that put individuals at risk.

Not only does COVID-19 warn us of the costs and geopolitics of disinformation, it highlights the roles and responsibilities of the private sector in confronting these risks. Figuring out how to do so effectively, without suppressing legitimate critics, is one of the greatest challenges for the next decade.

3. Cyber resiliency and security matter more than ever.

Our university has moved our work online. We are holding meetings by video chat and conducting virtual courses. While many dont have this luxury, including those on the front lines of health and public safety or newly unemployed, thousands of other universities, businesses and other institutions also moved online a testament to the benefits of technological innovation.

At the same time, these moves remind us of the importance of strong encryption, reliable networks and effective cyber defenses. Today network outages are not just about losing access to Netflix but about losing livelihoods. Cyber insecurity is also a threat to public health, such as when ransomware attacks disrupt entire medical facilities.

4. Smart technologies as a lifeline.

The virus also exposes the promise and risks of the internet of things, the globe-spanning web of always-on, always-connected cameras, thermostats, alarm systems and other physical objects. Smart thermometers, blood pressure monitors and other medical devices are increasingly connected to the web. This makes it easier for people with pre-existing conditions to manage their health at home, rather than having to seek treatment in a medical facility where they are at much greater risk of exposure to the disease.

Yet this reliance on the internet of things carries risks. Insecure smart devices can be co-opted to disrupt democracy and society, such as when the Mirai botnet hijacked home appliances to disrupt critical news and information sites in the fall of 2016. When digitally interconnected devices are attacked, their benefits suddenly disappear adding to the sense of crisis and sending those dependent on connected home diagnostic tools into already overcrowded hospitals.

5. Tech supply chain is a point of vulnerability.

The shutdown of Chinese factories in the wake of the pandemic interrupted the supply of critical parts to many industries, including the U.S. tech sector. Even Apple had to temporarily halt production of the iPhone. Had China not begun to recover, the toll on the global economy could have been even greater than it is now.

This interdependence of our supply chain is neither new nor tech-specific. Manufacturing medical and otherwise has long depended on parts from all over the world. The crisis serves as a reminder of the global, complex interactions of the many companies that produce gadgets, phones, computers and many other products on which the economy and society as a whole depend. Even if the virus had never traveled outside of China, the effects would have reverberated highlighting ways in which even local crises have global ramifications.

Cyber Policy in Everything

As the next phase of the pandemic response unfolds, society will be grappling with more and more difficult questions. Among the many challenges are complex choices about how to curb the spread of the disease while preserving core freedoms. How much tracking and surveillance are people willing to accept as a means of protecting public health?

As Laura explains in The Internet in Everything, cyber policy is now entangled with everything, including health, the environment and consumer safety. Choices that we make now, about cybersecurity, speech online, encryption policies and product design will have dramatic ramifications for health, security and basic human flourishing.

Laura DeNardis is a professor of communication studies at American University School of Communication and Jennifer Daskal is a professor of law and faculty director of the Technology, Law & Security Program at American University.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Society's Dependence on the Internet: 5 Cyber Issues the Coronavirus Lays Bare - Nextgov

The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed over 42,000 people worldwide according to Johns Hopkins University, but the figure may be far from reality as countries like Turkmenistan take drastic steps to suppress information about the spread of pandemic.

A recent report by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reveals that the central Asian country has banned the word Coronavirus as the country continues to deny any information on the spread of virus.

According to Turkmenistan Chronicle, one of the few sources of independent news, the state-controlled media are no longer allowed to use the word and it has even been removed from health information brochures distributed in schools, hospitals and workplaces.

There is no data available on the number of coronavirus patients in the country. A correspondent of Chronicles of Turkmenistan reports from the infectious diseases hospital in Ashgabat that a lot of patients with respiratory infections have been admitted to the hospital but all of them are officially diagnosed with acute respiratory viral infection.

According to journalists based in the capital, Ashgabat, who report for Radio Azatlyk, the Turkmen language service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, people wearing face masks or talking about the coronavirus on the street, at bus stops or in lines outside shops are liable to be arrested by plainclothes police.

The Turkmen authorities have lived up to their reputation by adopting this extreme method for eradicating all information about the coronavirus, said Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSFs Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk.

However, a report by Turkmenistan Chronicle says, despite the official statements about no confirmed cases, large-scale prevention measures are underway in the country. In public places and bank officers people are provided with sanitizers to wipe their hands and are requested to use a mouth spray; at the train stations and at entry checkpoints in Ashgabat residents get their temperature taken; the municipal buses are disinfected with a chlorine solution. Even bus stops are washed with an unidentified sanitizer.

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Turkmenistan bans the word Coronavirus, wearing of masks, in a major censorship move - The Statesman

On Tuesday, it emerged that the Indian government had asked the Supreme Court to legalise censorship. Claiming that there is a high chance of panicked reactions based on any deliberate or unintended fake or inaccurate reporting, it urged the court to issue orders that would not allow any news to be published or broadcast without media organisations first ascertaining the true factual position meaning whatever the government says.

The Supreme Court ultimately chose not to institute a system of censorship, but accepted the governments dubious claim that the mass exodus of migrant workers over the last week was due to fake news. We do not intend to interfere with the free discussion about the pandemic, but direct the media refer to and publish the official version about the developments, the court said in its verdict.

The problem with these contentions is that they miss the actual reason for panic in the country over the last two weeks.

First there was a wave of panic buying in Indias markets even before Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a self-imposed janata curfew, simply because of his reputation for political unpredictability.

There was even more panic buying after Modis second speech, because he did not clearly explain to people how they could get food and medicines during the three-week shutdown, prompting the prime minister to tweet in all caps, THERE IS NO NEED TO PANIC.

Finally, the migrant labour exodus began as soon as it became clear that lockdowns were being considered and that work and wages would dry up. In Delhi, as the Bharatiya Janata Party sought to wriggle out of responsibility for the masses of workers heading out of the city, it floated the theory that the flight had been caused by the actions of the Aam Aadmi Party government. It did not identify the media as the villain.

It is clear thaat the panic and rumours have come about not because of the media but because of the lack of information from the government. The courts directions to the media that it must take the official version are a problem because, in many cases, the government has simply not been forthcoming.

The government has made it difficult to access most information whether it is data on the number of people who have been confirmed with Covid-19, how much testing India is doing, whether the government has sufficient stockpiles of safety equipment, what the spread of the disease looks like, why there were major delays in sourcing of gear for healthcare workers, the technical specifications for testing kits approved for use in India, and much more.

In many cases, it was only after repeated questioning that the government issued the information at all. In fact, there has been so much stone-walling that a collective of health reporters across various news organisations decided to publish this list of 10 questions that the government needs to answer.

This lack of transparency is short-sighted. By refusing to give information, or not creating the systems for easy dissemination, the government may believe it can better control the narrative. But diseases cannot be beaten by winning the narrative.

Here are three reasons why the government should be much more transparent.

In this age of social media and a 24-hour news cycle, a limited amount of information from the government will only lead to more speculation about the situation. The best way to combat this is by providing precise, detailed information and to disseminate it widely.

There is undoubtedly fake news going around but the best way to defeat it would be for the government to answer all the questions that journalists pose and ensure that any citizen can easily access information. Hiding data, delaying numbers and refusing to answer questions does not inspire any confidence. It will only inspire more rumours.

For India to effectively battle the pandemic, officials from the local level up to the Central as well as many in the private sector must be focused on taking on Covid-19 right now. Yet the government has not even been transparent about which testing kits for the coronavirus have been approved for use by private companies and state governments.

This may just have been an oversight. But it is only when the media is free to ask questions that the governments attention will be drawn to such crucial gaps in information that could have a direct bearing on how successful India is in its fight against Covid-19.

This is not just about looking bad under media questioning. This is about having all the information to address the Coronavirus crisis.

No one criticises the government for not already having a vaccine to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus. Why? Because people understand that this is a new phenomenon that has precipitated a global crisis and will take all the best efforts of governments and individuals all over the world to combat.

Indeed, we need to look far beyond the capabilities of just the Indian state. The Principal Scientific Adviser to the government of India has called on the countryslarge pool of scientists and companies working in the field of science to help take on this challenge. The NITI Aayog has called for doctors to volunteer to tackle the outbreak. Many in Indias Information Technology sector organsed a hackathon to develop apps that can assist in the battle.

Indeed, much of the worlds responses to Covid-19 have been aided by involvement of private individuals, whether researchers or coders or medical professionals.

But for government to enlist the public in this battle whether it is a medical scholar in a small town that needs to know which testing kits are approved or an I-T professional who needs more data about testing to design better analytics or a high-net-worth individual who wants to source and distribute protective equipment but doesnt know whether India is lacking them and which part of the country has insufficient stockpiles it will only be possible if authorities are forthcoming with information.

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Indias government wants to censor the media to fight Covid-19 but transparency is a better weapon - Scroll.in

Apart from the devastating crash that Bitcoin is currently facing, another potential threat to the pioneer cryptocurrency and the entire crypto industry at large is censorship from giant tech companies like YouTube.

In a recent bout of censorship, two separate crypto YouTube channels had videos deleted temporarily.

The two YouTubers who had their videos deleted include Ivan on Tech (a crypto programmer) and The Moon (a crypto reporter and technical analyst).

Both responded to the matter via twitter saying that they had received several strikes from YouTube about Bitcoin being harmful content.

YouTube has a long history of censoring crypto content.

At the tail end of 2019, many crypto YouTubers including seasoned content creators like Nicholas Merten received content strikes from YouTube despite not uploading videos for days.

In a tweet, Merten said,

In response, The MoonCarl also replied in a tweet that acknowledged a similar move by YouTube on his channel.

Other channels like Nugget News received up to two content strikes in a single day with 50 videos being removed from the channel.

Saunders, the owner of Nugget News, expressed fears of the channel getting deleted from YouTube in a tweet that read,

Also affected was a Canadian Bitcoin educator with a channel called BTCSessions and Chriss Dunn a crypto and finance reporter.

Following the crypto purge of 2019 on YouTube, an outrage emerged on twitter to which YouTube replied saying that the decision to ban Bitcoin and cryptocurrency videos from its site was an error and the removed videos would be reinstated.

It might be argued that the move was meant to protect consumers from scams.

However, for most onlookers as well as the entire crypto community, the move does not make any sense especially since Google and Facebook already lifted the crypto advertising ban in 2018.

Invezz asked Mati Greenspan, the founder of Quantum Economics, about his opinion on whether the current bout of crypto censorship is as a result of the companys hidden agenda or the result of an internal error.

In his reply, Greenspan said that it is difficult to know for sure but many in the community feel that the censorship is international.

He adds,

We could only speculate on why they might want to censor crypto content, perhaps it threatens their current future business model in some way.

While speaking to Decrypt, a YouTube spokesman said,

With the massive volume of videos on our site, sometimes we make the wrong call.When its brought to our attention that a video has been removed mistakenly, we act quickly to reinstate it.

However, with recent reports indicating a continuation of the crypto ban on YouTube, the reasons for deletion crypto-related videos remains to be anyones guess.

While YouTube hasnt responded to the recent bout of censorship and why its still affecting crypto-related channels, some on twitter have suggested moving crypto content to decentralized platforms that are censorship-resistant.

In reaction to last years crypto purge on YouTube, Greenspan together with several crypto YouTubers moved to boycott YouTube.

This time around, when asked whether there are any other viable decentralized alternatives for crypto YouTubers, Greenspan replied,

Im not sure there are any viable decentralized options at this point. For myself though, Ive preferred not to stream on YouTube for the time being and instead am hosting live streams on Periscope and Twitter.

Weighing in on the matter, Chris Burniske, a renowned crypto influencer, tweeted that such violations by companies like YouTube, will push suppliers and consumers away from platforms and towards protocols.

Burniske also added that since platforms like YouTube are owned by shareholders and give no governance rights to suppliers and consumers and further centralize economic resources over time, the violations crypto YouTubers are facing currently are bound to repeatedly occur.

Censorship on platforms like YouTube has existed for a long time. While there are many theories on twitter explaining the reasons for the latest censorship bout, it is clear to most like Burniske that this will not be the end of it. Platforms like YouTube face pressure from different governments, advertisers, and organizations to remove a wide range of content. Perhaps its time for the crypto community to create their decentralized alternatives much like how Everipedia is disrupting the Wikipedia formula without the use of advertisement.

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YouTube continues to ban crypto content; None knows the reason - iNVEZZ

Isaac Lawrence/AFP via Getty ImagesPro-democracy activists holding pictures of missing citizen journalist Fang Bin and anti-corruption activistXu Zhiyong, who had been interrogating President Xi Jinpings handling of the Covid-19 crisis, at a protest outside the Chinese liaison office in Hong Kong, February 19, 2020

For authoritarian-minded leaders, the coronavirus crisis is offering a convenient pretext to silence critics and consolidate power. Censorship in China and elsewhere has fed the pandemic, helping to turn a potentially containable threat into a global calamity. The health crisis will inevitably subside, but autocratic governments dangerous expansion of power may be one of the pandemics most enduring legacies.

In times of crisis, peoples health depends at minimum on free access to timely, accurate information. The Chinese government illustrated the disastrous consequence of ignoring that reality. When doctors in Wuhan tried to sound the alarm in December about the new coronavirus, authorities silenced and reprimanded them. The failure to heed their warnings gave Covid-19 a devastating three-week head start. As millions of travelers left or passed through Wuhan, the virus spread across China and around the world.

Even now, the Chinese government is placing its political goals above public health. It claims that the coronavirus has been tamed but wont allow independent verification. It is expelling journalists from several leading US publications, including those that have produced incisive reporting, and has detained independent Chinese reporters who venture to Wuhan. Meanwhile, Beijing is pushing wild conspiracy theories about the origin of the virus, hoping to deflect attention from the tragic results of its early cover-up.

Others are following Chinas example. In Thailand, Cambodia, Venezuela, Bangladesh, and Turkey, governments are detaining journalists, opposition activists, healthcare workers, and anyone else who dares to criticize the official response to the coronavirus. Needless to say, ignorance-is-bliss is not an effective public health strategy.

When independent media is silenced, governments are able to promote self-serving propaganda rather than facts. Egypts President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, for example, downplayed the coronavirus threat for weeks, apparently wanting to avoid harming Egypts tourist industry. His government expelled a Guardian correspondent and warned a New York Times journalist after their articles questioned government figures on the number of coronavirus cases.

The government of Turkeys President Recep Tayyip Erdogan implausibly denies that there are any Covid-19 cases in its prisons, and a prosecutor is investigating a member of parliamenthimself a doctorwho says that a seventy-year-old inmate and a member of the prison staff have tested positive. Thailands Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-ocha warned journalists to report on government press conferences only and not to interview medical personnel in the field.

Of course, a free media is not a certain antidote. Responsible government is also needed. US President Donald Trump initially called the coronavirus a hoax. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called the virus a fantasy and preventive measures hysterical. Before belatedly telling people to stay home, Mexican President Andrs Manuel Lpez Obrador ostentatiously held rallies, and hugged, kissed, and shook hands with supporters. But at least a free media can highlight such irresponsibility; a silenced media allows it to proceed unchallenged.

Recognizing that the public is more willing to accept government power grabs in times of crisis, some leaders see the coronavirus as an opportunity not only to censor criticism but also to undermine checks and balances on their power. Much as the war on terrorism was used to justify certain long-lasting restrictions on civil liberties, so the fight against the coronavirus threatens longer-term damage to democratic rule.

Although Hungary has reported Covid-19 infections only in the hundreds to date, Prime Minister Viktor Orbn used his partys parliamentary majority to secure an indefinite state of emergency that enables him to rule by decree and imprison for up to five years any journalist who disseminates news that is deemed false. Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has also awarded himself emergency powers to silence fake news.

As Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces corruption charges, his justice minister cited the coronavirus to suspend courts for most cases, as did a close parliamentary ally as he attempted to prevent the oppositions new majority from ousting him as Knesset speakera move that the Israeli Supreme Court said undermin[ed] the foundations of the democratic process. The Trump administration has cited the coronavirus to discourage requests under the Freedom of Information Act, suddenly insisting they be made by only traditional mail, in spite of the greater public health safety of electronic communication.

Some governments are breathing a sigh of relief that the coronavirus has provided a convenient reason to limit political demonstrations. The Algerian government has halted regular protests seeking genuine democratic reform that have been under way for more than a year. The Russian government has stopped even single-person protests against Vladimir Putins plans to rip up term limits on his presidency. The Indian governments recently announced three-week lockdown conveniently ends the running protests against Prime Minister Narendra Modis anti-Muslim citizenship policies. It remains to be seen whether such restrictions outlive the coronavirus threat.

Other governments are using the coronavirus to intensify digital surveillance. China has deepened and extended the surveillance state that is most developed in Xinjiang, where it was used to identify some of the one million Uighur and other Turkic Muslims for detention and forced indoctrination. South Korea has broadcast detailed and highly revealing information about peoples movements to anyone who might have had contact with them. Israels government has cited the coronavirus to authorize its Shin Bet internal security agency to use vast amounts of location-tracking data from the cellphones of ordinary Israelis. In Moscow, Russia is installing one of the worlds largest surveillance camera systems equipped with facial recognition technology. As occurred after September 11, 2001, it may be difficult to put the surveillance genie back in the bottle after the crisis fades.

There is no question these are extraordinary times. International human rights law permits restrictions on liberty in times of national emergency that are necessary and proportionate. But we should be very wary of leaders who exploit this crisis to serve their political ends. They are jeopardizing both democracy and our health.

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How Authoritarians Are Exploiting the Covid-19 Crisis to Grab Power - The New York Review of Books

Months after the Coronavirus outbreak began in the city of Wuhan, residents have only just been given the chance to collect the ashes of loved ones. In these recently released photos that have been censored, residents can be seen queuing for hours on end to collect the remains of lost family members.

Residents of Wuhan were seen queuing this week to collect the ashes of their close family members that have died to the Coronavirus. This is the first time residents have been able to collect ashes due to a past ban on operating cremation facilities. The city of Wuhan has been on lockdown for months ever since it was reported that it was the epicenter for the worlds first cases of Coronavirus.

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A similar practice has occurred at Wuhans Wuchang Funeral Home. The video below shows staff members calling out the names of those that have passed as ashes are given out. Audio in the video also claims that Cremation is free and that the government is giving out free urns to all those that visit. The validity of these statements is unknown.

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These photos were originally posted on social media site, Weibo. However, according to new claims, these photos have been censored from the site. In the past, it has been reported that Weibo works closely with the Chinese government to censor content. According to a whistleblower that worked at the site for 2 years, there are over 160 censorship employees working for Weibo.

Heres what the whistleblower told the CPJ about Weibos censorship program:

The Communist Party was terrified by Weibo, staring at it with fear and the determination to tame it The core of Weibo censorship is the lack of clear rules that users can follow. You dont know whether you will be the next target of censorship. Such tactics instill fear in you, then you start to behave yourself. Gradually, it becomes natural not to speak your mind. Over time, you lose the ability to express yourself as a normal person would do in a free society. That is the effect of censorship in the longrun.

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Corona Cover-Up? Videos The Chinese Government Would Rather You Don't See Surface on The Internet - Talent Recap