Privacy Digest

Amnesty International: "The virus of Internet repression is spreading":

Arguing that censorship is a "virus" affecting the health of the Internet, Amnesty International UK yesterday sponsored a conference called "Some People Think the Internet Is a Bad Thing: The Struggle for Freedom of Expression in Cyberspace." Unless something is done, and soon, Amnesty warns that the Internet "could change beyond all recognition."

The conference, which featured Jimmy Wales, Richard Stallman, and recently-jailed US blogger Josh Wolf, highlighted the growing issue of government-mandated filtering, which is now conducted by 25 countries. Azerbaijan, Burma, India, South Korea, and Thailand all made the list; a complete, worldwide Internet filtering map is also available from the OpenNet Initiative. For those who missed the conference, an archived webcast is available.

"The virus of Internet repression is spreading," said Tim Hancock, Amnesty UK's campaigns director. "The 'Chinese model'—of an Internet that allows economic growth but not free speech or privacy—is growing in popularity, from a handful of countries five years ago to dozens of governments today who block sites and arrest bloggers."

Amnesty reserves particular criticism for the firms—often American—that go along with censorship or actively contribute to it. The group has attacked Yahoo, Microsoft, and Google especially for their dealings in China, where all three countries have been involved in censorship or turned over pro-democracy e-mails to the Chinese government.

Not all bad

But even Amnesty admits that not all censorship is bad, making the entire debate more murky. For instance, European countries often censor "hate speech" or anything that appears designed to incite racial hatred—something that Amnesty supports. British historian David Irving was jailed in Austria in early 2006 over remarks he made doubting the extent of the Holocaust; his defenders decried the decision in the same terms that anti-censorship groups now use to talk about the Internet. Academic Deborah Lipstadt told the BBC at the time, "I am not happy when censorship wins, and I don't believe in winning battles via censorship... The way of fighting Holocaust deniers is with history and with truth."

(Read Original Article - Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)