Internet Censorship in Iran

The article I read for this week discussed the recent election-related Iranian crack-down on Internet sites that are used by protesters to question the recent Iranian election results and to communicate with other protesters. Iran has also blocked access to countless sites, including networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr.

Nonetheless, there is a growing community of Internet users inside Iran and in other countries who are devising ways to get around the government's censorship and to let the world know what is actually happening in Iran. Many users are using Internet proxies, which are "Web servers set up in other countries that allow Iranians to hide their computer's Internet Protocol address from censors within the country." Other users are logging onto to their Internet accounts through Tor, "a free Web page designed to allow users to surf the Web and communicate with each other anonymously." While some protesters in Iran are still able to get around the government censorship, many have seen their online access restricted or shut down, and there has been a decline in information leaving Iran through the Internet. That said, protesters are still fighting to be heard, and they are trying to stay one step ahead of their government so they can relay important information to the world and practice their right to be heard.

I thought this article was so interesting! The whole time I was reading it, I kept thinking of Little Brother. The groups of protesters trying to evade the government censors and fight back through tech-savvy means reminds me so much of Marcus and his story. It is a bit like seeing the novel play out in real life. It worries me, though, that protesters who are caught may face the same horrible consequences some of those people faced in the book. They really are fighting for their freedoms.

Article:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/06/18/iran.dodging.crackdown/index.html

Censorship Software on New PCs in China

This article discusses China's newest attempt to censor the Internet. They are now requiring that a filtering software called Green Dam be installed on any new PC sold in the country starting July 1 (schools also had to install the software). Supposedly, the software is designed to filter pornographic sites and allows the government to update the software with a list of banned websites. Many worry that the government will use the software to block any sites they deem unfit, to monitor Internet use, and to collect personal information. The general manager of the company that designed the software says censorship worries are not needed and that parents can simply turn off the software. Many are skeptical.

PC makers that are affected by this (Dell, Lenovo, and HP) are not commenting, but are said to be unhappy about aiding censorship and the lack of warning, time, and consultation they received from the Chinese government. Early reports by users who have installed the software have said it made their computers slow, still allowed pornography to come through, and made browsing the Internet more difficult.

This seems to me to be a not-so-subtle way to make computer makers part of a broad Internet censorship attempt in China. I truly don't think the government will use it to simply filter pornographic sites but will instead use it to censor a host of sites. It is frustrating to read things like this, but it is important to be globally aware. I don't know what the answer is in China... I almost hope there is a movement like in Little Brother where people are not yielding to these crazy rulers.

Article: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/09/world/asia/09china.html

Uncovering Censorship in Our Own Backyard: Herdict

This article is about a new website called Herdict, which was produced by The Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. The website was launched in March of 2009, and its goal is to provide real-time information of subtle Internet censorship and filtering by governments and commercial firms. It is reliant on "crowd-sourcing," which means Internet users to report sites that are blocked or running slow. Heredict then plots this information using a map, thereby showing online censorship in real-time.

The website's creator, Jonathan Zittrain, believes Herdict can show subtle censorship occuring in the West. It is not only government censorship, but commercial, as well, that Herdict can spot. Zittrain points out that Internet service providers and websites make decisions about what appears on the Internet and what does not, with and without public knowledge. Many worry this type of monitoring could lead to abuse, and they hope Herdict can help.

Herdict may also be able to pinpoint when service providers are violating "Net neutrality" by restricting or slowing down access to sites the providers are not doing business with. Herdict can also show cases of service providers using geolocational filtering, which means they block content relevant to a specific government or country, for whatever reason. It is hoped that Herdict will allow people to see how subtle Internet censorship may be happening right now.

I think this a great, creative idea! To be able to track this sort of thing in real-time is amazing. And it allows researchers to go back over the data and look into instances to see if there may be a tie to censorship or something else. The article points out that it is not always censorship that Herdict detects. In once instance, a website was down for maintenance, but the site had been on a list of censored sites, and the user information allowed people to investigate it to determine if it was censorship. Censorship can be subtle, and hopefully this type of thing will open peoples' eyes to it.

Article:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/197907

Is Sexting Protected by the First and Fourth Amendments?

Three students are suing a state prosecutor in relation to a sexting case. Last February, twenty students at a northeastern Pennsylvania school were found to have sent or to be in a cell phone photo that District Attorney George P. Skumanick considered “provocative.” One photo in the suit shows two girls in bras from the waist up. Another shows a girl with a towel wrapped underneath her breasts. The photos were discovered when many of the students in question had their cell phones confiscated and searched at school. The state prosecutor threatened all of the students with sexual abuse of a minor charges for sexting semi-nude or nude photos of themselves. The charges could lead to jail time and registration as a sex offender. To avoid charges, the prosecutor required the students to attend a 10 hour class concerning pornography and sexual violence. Seventeen of the students accepted the deal, but three girls are fighting it based on their First and Fourth Amendment rights of freedom of expression and their rights to oppose the prosecutor’s deal.

There are many issues that this case brings up. First, does freedom of expression mean that minors have the right to send nude photos of themselves to other people? The defense attorney for the three girls contends that the two photos in question here do not constitute child pornography because they do not show the girls in any sexual activity, and they do not show intent for child pornography. Another issue is should minors be labeled and registered as sex offenders for sending nude or semi-nude photos to their boyfriends, girlfriends, or friends? The context and intent of the photos are clearly important, but I’m sure many these photos are not sent with illegal or harmful intent. The other issue is searching a student’s cell phone. One article states that cell phones contain personal information protected by the Fourth Amendment. Should schools have the right to search students’ cell phones?

Articles:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/26/us/26sextext.html?_r=1&ref=education

http://www.ncac.org/The-Right-to-Sext-Sending-Nude-Photos-of-Oneself-is-a-Right

http://www.aclupa.org/downloads/MillerComplaintfinal.pdf

Tennessee School Districts Censor GLBT Websites

In April, I read about a Tennessee school librarian and two Tennessee high school students who had contacted the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) for help regarding Internet filters that two Tennessee school districts were using which restricted students from accessing any website that included GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender) information and resources. The ACLU wrote a letter to each school district and gave them until April 29 to reply.

Two days ago, I read that one of the school districts did not respond to the ACLU's letter, and while the other district did respond, the response did not show enough "good faith" regarding the issue. Therefore, school media specialist Karyn Stort-Brinks and two students, along with the ACLU of Tennessee, decided to sue the Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools and Knox County Schools. They claim that censorship of GLBT sites infringes on the students' First Amendment rights and denies them access to vital information, resources, and organizations regarding GLBT. They also state that the filters deny students access to both sides of the issue by filtering GLBT information but not sites related to the other side of the argument.

I 100 percent agree with the lawsuit and commend the librarian and the students for standing against such practices. I cannot believe schools would even think about using this type of filtering software. The April article states that Tennessee schools must use filters to protect students from harmful and obscene sites, but this filtering software, provided by Educational Networks of America, is set to automatically filter the term GLBT. I think this is ridiculous. There is a large amount of educational information that students cannot access because of these filters. The scary thing is that 105 other districts in the state use filtering software provided by ENA. Can you imagine how many students are being restricted from accessing these sites? This seems absurd to me, and I hope this sort of discrimination is ended quickly in Tennessee and anywhere else this software or similar filtering systems are being used.

Article: http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/article/CA6659561.html