Category Archives: Censorship

Censorship is not civility.

Yet that's the argument made in this newspaper last Sunday by columnist Tim Rutten. (Killing 'illegal' is about civility, not politics.)

Rutten made a spirited defense of The Associated Press' decision to prohibit their reporters from using the phrase "illegal immigrant" when referring to an individual.

I couldn't disagree more.

The last people on earth who should be telling journalists what words they can and can't use are fellow journalists. That's exactly what the AP has chosen to do.

"Illegal should describe only an action," explained AP Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll. "Our goal always is to use the most precise and accurate words so that the meaning is clear to any reader anywhere. "

Nonsense. This isn't about style; it's about setting the boundaries of debate.

George Orwell, author of "1984," in his essay "Politics and the English Language" said, "Never use a long word where a short one will do."

"Illegal immigrant" is the vernacular. This is how people speak. But the Associate Press has concluded the term is offensive, an ethnic slur, and therefore what are we left to conclude? If the AP isn't making a political statement, it is certainly making a moral judgment. The objective reporters of facts are now partisans.

While the Senate and House of Representatives

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Doug McIntyre: There's nothing civil about censorship

Leftist "Media Reform" Group Accused of Censorship
Project Censored is censored by the National Conference for Media Reform. Activist Fran Shure complains to Josh Stearns of "Free Press" about suppressing a "...

By: americassurvival

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Leftist "Media Reform" Group Accused of Censorship - Video

Apple's 'baffling censorship problem' has left app developers and comic publishers unsure about what they can submit to the App Store, after an issue of space fantasy comic Saga is blocked for containing adult content.

[UPDATE, 11 April]: Comic distribution platform Comixology, which handles the Saga series for Image Comics has released a statement saying reports of Saga issue 12 being banned by Apple are untrue.

Comixology CEO and co-founder, David Steinberger, said the following:

"As a partner of Apple, we have an obligation to respect its policies for apps and the books offered in apps. Based on our understanding of those policies, we believed that Saga #12 could not be made available in our app, and so we did not release it today.

"We did not interpret the content in question as involving any particular sexual orientation, and frankly that would have been a completely irrelevant consideration under any circumstance...it should be clear that Apple did not reject Saga #12."

Steinberger went on to say that his company's interpretation of Apple's policies was mistaken, and Saga issue 12 is now available through the App Store.

Original story, 10 April.

Edition 12 of the comic, which is distributed through an iPhone and iPad application, was not allowed to be published because it contained two scenes of gay sex. Explicit adult content is banned under Apple's terms and conditions, but previous issues of Saga have been granted access to the App Store, despite having similar content.

Ron Richards, director of business development at Image Comics, told IBTimes UK: "Censoring of apps is definitely a problem, especially for apps that contain content [such as comics, books, magazines].

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Comic Publisher 'Baffled' by Apple 'Censorship Problem'

The word censorship evokes Communist Russia or North Koreanot exactly sleepy, friendly Santa Fe.

Yet according to Tiffany Shackelford, the executive director for the national Association for Alternative Newsmedia (of which SFR is a member), thats exactly what happened to SFR last week.

In case you missed the breathless TV newscasts (A provocative cover for an unconventional paper! KOAT proclaimed), last Wednesday, a disgruntled reader confiscated some 400 copies of SFR shortly after the most recent issue hit newsstands.

People who steal papers just to keep information from getting out to the public are actively engaging in acts of censorship, Shackelford says. Thats an act of censorship.

It started with an anonymous call around 10 am. The caller said the paper was filthy and said he planned to remove copies of SFR from newsstands around town. Although he didnt specify what, exactly, he considered filthy, the cover of the paper featured the headline Nuts to Buttsa reference to a controversial prison shakedown technique, and the topic of that weeks cover story. The image showed the backs of a mans bare legs (actually, the legs of SFR staff writer Joey Peters), with an orange prison jumpsuit around his ankles.

Here at SFR, angry calls about less-than-G-rated material arent exactly uncommonbut rarely do they turn into acts of censorship.

Ultimately, it probably did less harm than good. By the end of the day, we had ordered 1,000 additional copies of the Nuts to Butts issue and taped two TV interviews for that nights 10 pm broadcast. Only around 400 of the 19,500 papers wed printed were actually taken, and the rest were flying off the stands.

When theres something in there that someone doesnt want people to read, they wanna read it, you know? says Brian Clarey, the editor of the Greensboro, NC-based YES! Weekly, an alternative weekly paper that experienced a similar incident in 2009. There really is no such thing as bad publicity. Ive had to repeat that to myself over and over and over again, but something like this is great.

But to Shackelford and others, the ease with which free papers like SFR can be suppressedand the lack of recourse when it comes to prosecuting censorshippoint to more worrisome trends.

When the government doesnt fully prosecute people, theyre aiding and abetting censorship, Shackelford says. Were talking a lot about transparency these days, and how the government is getting allegedly better on things like freedom of information, yet theres a major, major issue with censorship.

Link:
The Censorship Issue

Popular video sharing site Vimeo was blocked by Indonesias largest telco Telkomsel for a short while. And while it was still being blocked, the only reasonable answer that the companys customer service and staff had was that Vimeo was somehow associated with the only thing that is being widely censored in Indonesia: porn.

As the third largest democratic country in the world, the news media here can still talk about anything that they want (albeit with a few discouragements), even when it is related to the first familys dodgy tax returns. One of the reporters of the above article tweeted about his experience being contacted time and time again by the presidents staff. And The Jakarta Post office was heavily discouraged from publishing the article. But still, the government couldnt do anything other than that, and the article was published, putting the president in the spotlight.

But as the second largest Muslim populated country in the world, it is still very sensitive about pornographic material. The ICT minister Tifatul Sembiring (being also a representative of an Islamic-oriented political party, the PKS) has vowed to curb porn in Indonesia. This is the same minister who has blocked more than one million porn sites, and was even able to force RIM (now known as Blackberry) to filter porn on its Blackberry handsets two years ago.

Just last week Tifatul also made a request to Twitter to see if the US-based company can censor porn-related tweets to protect Indonesian children from accessing those sites. Twitters new country-by-country censorship policy might be able to grant that request, but so far there is no update about the enquiry.

While porn sites are definitely being blocked by the Indonesian government, interestingly porn site Xvideos is sitting securely at the 48th spot in Indonesia according to Alexas rankings. There are indeed ways to overcome the censorship like changing the DNS address, using proxy servers, or using VPN services. And you could do those on your mobile phones too.

Though sometimes the government and telcos get it right concerning which sites should indeed be blocked under the nations anti-porn laws, there are times when they get it wrong. Vimeo is one such example - its an artistic site crucial for young filmmakers in the country to get global, creative exposure.

Indonesia is still a democratic country which respects your freedom of speech - but with a religious twist. But when an unfair block happens, young web users know that there are ways to still access whatever is being censored.

Originally posted here:
Censorship in Indonesia: No Porn Please!

BEIJING At a rare public forum on cyberissues Tuesday featuring American and Chinese government officials, U.S. diplomats and business leaders tried using economic arguments to persuade China to stop its cyberattacks and Internet censorship.

Chinas heavy-handed Web restrictions not only slow Internet speeds and make company data less secure, but they also have tangible economic effects on the country, said Gary Locke, the U.S. ambassador to China.

Undersecretary of State Robert Hormats was even more blunt in calling out China for its actions.

I ask my Chinese friends to question whether this kind of activity serves Chinas real interests as it seeks to attract high-end investment, aims to develop international markets for its innovative products, and wants its companies welcomed and respected as they increasingly invest around the world, Hormats said.

In recent months, after news reports publicly tied cyberattacks originating from China to the Chinese military, U.S. officials have taken a harsher and more direct tone in confronting China on the issue.

Tuesdays comments were made during an Internet forum sponsored by Microsoft, which carefully featured an equal number of Chinese and U.S. officials.

Chinese officials stuck mostly to previous boilerplate responses to such accusations: China is in the early stages of its development; far from perpetrating cyberattacks, China is among the most frequent targets; andChina opposes the actions of rogue hackers.

One Chinese official, however, went on the offensive.

Recently some people have cooked up this theory of a Chinese cybersecurity threat, said Qian Xiaoqian, vice minister of Chinas State Council Information Office. It is a variation on the popular theory of a rising China threat.

China has long opposed hacking, he said, and thinks we shouldnt militarize the cyberspace and attack other countries in violation of laws and regulations and also in violation of moral standards.

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U.S. government, business leaders push China on cyberattacks, Internet censorship

PARIS, April 8 (UPI) -- France's secret service is facing accusations of censorship for allegedly threatening to arrest a volunteer at the French version of Wikipedia over an article.

Intelligence operatives allegedly threatened to arrest and charge the volunteer unless he deleted an article on the Internet encyclopedia they claimed contained "classified" military secrets and was a risk to national security, the British newspaper The Guardian reported.

Wikipedia said the Direction Central du Renseignement Interieur failed to provide proof the article about a French military radio relay station that has been online since 2009 was a threat to the country's security or produce a legal order justifying its threats against the site.

"This is shocking and absolutely wrong," Christophe Henner, vice president of Wikimedia France, said. "We have always operated within the law and have no desire to pose a threat to individuals or nations."

The page "corresponds almost perfectly" to a publicly available television report about the military station 70 miles west of Lyon, Wikipedia said.

The station is under the control of the French air force and thought to be part of France's nuclear detection and deterrent network.

"Had the DCRI presented us with documents or a legal order showing us this was a threat to national security we would have taken down the page at once," Henner said. "Instead they summoned one of our volunteers and ordered him to take it down, saying he would be held in custody if he didn't."

The rest is here:
French secret service in censorship flap

Today in international tech news: After failed threats, France's intelligence agency draws thousands of eyes to the Wikipedia page it wanted removed. Also: A human rights group will equip activists with an electronic tracking bracelet that can trip a social media alarm; a European telecom gets big dough from Canada -- again -- to use BlackBerry; and China's Tencent defuses online angst and confirms its WeChat app will remain free.

Intelligence agents for the Direction Central du Renseignement Intrieur -- France's top intelligence agency -- were accused of censorship after threatening to arrest and charge a Wikipedia volunteer.

The hubbub originated with an article that contains classified military secrets, according to operatives, and ergo is a threat to national security. The article, which is still available, describes a military radio relay station in France that is believed to be part of the country's nuclear detection and deterrent network.

In March, the DCRI contacted Wikipedia's parent organization, the Wikimedia Foundation, about taking down the page. Wikimedia replied that DCRI hadn't provided evidence that the article was a risk, and therefore left it online.

Things got more interesting last week when the DCRI summoned a 30-year-old library curator, who is a Wikipedia volunteer and who has administrator's access to the site. The man reportedly had nothing to do with the page in question but claims he was told to take it down all the same. After declining, he was reportedly told that he would be held in custody and charged for failing to comply.

This sequence of events, rather predictably, resulted in unintended consequences: The vice president of Wikimedia France said that the page in question had between 10 and 60 visitors; as of Sunday, there were "around 10,000 from around the world."

The Wikimedia VP did add, though, that the page would indeed be taken down if DCRI produces the requisite legal papers.

[Source: The Guardian]

Stockholm-based human rights group Civil Rights Defenders has issued a GPS bracelet that will send out an alert should a bracelet's owner ever be kidnapped.

The first five bracelets -- designed to tip off CRD, nearby activists and CRD's social media network -- were handed out last week at "Defenders' Days," a CRD conference. Fifty-five such bracelets will be distributed over the next 18 months.

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France Implicated in Wikipedia Censorship Threat

SINGAPORE: Acting Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Lawrence Wong said the country's policy on censorship is evolving and moving away from censorship towards one of classification and self-regulation.

Mr Wong was speaking at a recording of Channel NewsAsia's programme "Ask Minister" where he was posed a range of questions from censorship to arts education.

He also said the government should work with a consultative panel made up of Singaporeans from diverse backgrounds and get them to share their views before setting any boundaries.

Mr Wong said: "Rather than to say these are OB markers and don't touch them whether it's politics, race or religion and say 'thou shall not touch it', I think we should move away from that and we should move to a situation where we have a dialogue on what the artist would like to convey even if it's a provocative issue on politics, race or religion and then have a conversation - whether it's with MDA that looks at content regulation or more importantly with audiences so that audiences can understand what they are doing."

Catch more of the discussion with Mr Lawrence Wong on April 9 at 8pm on "Ask Minister", exclusively on Channel NewsAsia.

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Censorship among issues to be discussed in "Ask Minister" programme

Dozens of Sudanese journalists protested for an end to censorship on Monday outside the offices of a respected newspaper whose editor was suspended by national security agents, a protester said.

"No to censorship," said a sign carried by the group of about 70 journalists who gathered outside the Al-Sahafa newspaper offices, the protester said.

Security forces did not intervene.

Al-Nour Ahmed Al-Nour, chief editor of the daily, said last week that agents of the powerful National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) told him he had been suspended -- a rare action against such a prominent journalist.

He said the decision appeared to be linked to a dispute over censorship, which journalists say the NISS continues to impose.

Reporters and press freedom advocates have complained that some Sudanese journalists were banned from writing and that NISS agents regularly block the distribution of papers.

Other newspapers have been suspended from publishing, but Nour is the first chief editor to be removed.

The incident prompted Sudan's government-run press council on Sunday to issue its strongest statement in years.

The council, which licenses newspapers and registers journalists, accused the NISS of interference and called on authorities to disband the press body if it cannot function.

Journalists on Monday also delivered a message to the press council, asking for an end to censorship and for Nour to be reinstated, the protester said.

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Sudanese journalists protest against censorship