Freedom of Expression vs Censorship Articles Subir Chowdhuri subir@desdevpro.com http://www.desdevpro.com 12 August 2009 Censorship Freedom of expression Internet Censorship is a highly controversial issue that has been hyped out ever so often by the media. Countries like Iran, China, Korea and Vietnam are known strict censorship policies, causing them to be known as "Enemies of the Internet" They impose severe censorship of political and adult content, gambling and sometimes, also human rights websites. Here, we examine both the pros and the cons of internet censorship in our society. What's this all about? As the Internet began to become a common resource in the average American home the issue of censorship came into the forefront. Understandably parents were unable to accept the possible repercussions of their children accessing objectionable material on the Internet and quickly began calling for censorship. Much to their dismay, years later little has been done to censor the content of the Internet, and programs designed to be installed on a specific computer and block incoming objectionable content have not been very effective. censor_01.jpg Censorship of the internet can be a good method of restricting unnecessary content that can be viewed on the web. With children and minors accessing the internet at an early age, it seems reasonable to want to regulate what children can access. For all of these benefits there seem to be an equally understandable counter proposal such as: instead of mandatory internet censorship why not just have a normal software net nanny with a password lock? Content censorship is somewhat like what is done on network television. For example, any offensive language would be banned, such as swears, slang terms and sexual references. Pornography wouldn't be permitted, nor would illicit drug photos or references, and any other stories or photos deemed explicit for a variety of reasons, including gore and sexuality. Despite recent efforts, widespread censoring of content seems not really possible. Unless various fines are attached to webmaster's who violate censorship laws, the immediate nature of the Internet alone contradicts censorship. With countless pages being added and updated every minute, developing a censor that covers all areas of the Internet would be very difficult, if not all together impossible. Attempts at censorship Unfortunately it seems that the ideas for Censorship in Australia have recently come to light and it's but one example of a government feeling threatened by the internet and its vast amount of content and information. They have so far proposed to block educational, informative and perfectly legal websites. A proposed list of banned websites has recently surfaced on the website censor_thumb.jpg http://www.wikileaks.com and on this list are certain wikipedia pages(!), a dentist's website, multiple legal gambling websites and websites with information on abortion. We need to ask ourselves, is it right for internet censorship to block perfectly legal websites even if they have some graphic content. Does the context in which the graphics or websites fall under not matter? In a digital age, isn't it important for us to keep as many useful and educational sites available as we can, amongst the flood of video games and entertainment? The technical issues of censorship are important when it comes to countries that don't have state-of-the-art or advanced internet. In the ISP filter trial report (see www.acma.gov.au ), it states that 10,000 sites will be blocked incorrectly out of every million. Also on this report it stated that Australia's internet will be slowed by up to 80% if the filter is implemented and in a country where slow internet is generally a way of life, this is not a good idea. The proposed filter whilst big and costly is, to put it bluntly, dumb. Any basic proxy or virtual private network can easily get past the filter. The proxy would also need to be able to monitor the internet for websites with blacklisted content. This means constant monitoring of changing and new websites, which is an impossible task. Internet censorship can be a good thing depending on the degree of severity the party in question is willing to impose onto the internet. Overly strict or threatened governments can react harshly to the internet and block content that they believe could influence people's opinions or that the government is overly biased about. Controlled forms of censorship, where only material that is deemed illegal for reasons of laws appropriate to the country, can be an efficient way of regulating what the populace sees. Morality and legality are two very different things and no government should decide the morale stance for the population of their country. What an individual decides to do in the privacy of their own home is their business as long as it's not illegal. Battle against Censorship censor_02.gif One of the leaders in the battle against Internet censorship is the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit group that runs the Blue Ribbon Campaign to fight Internet censorship and protect online freedom of expression. The site provides blue ribbons that can be downloaded and displayed on personal websites, such as the one shown below. The Blue Ribbon Campaign reinforces the importance of the first amendment to protect the right of free speech as "a fundamental building block of free society." censor_03.gif PeaceFire is an organization that opposes censorship. The group tracks the latest developments in censorship tactics and the fallacies of the Internet filter programs. PeaceFire is unique in that it is intended to represent the interests of those under 18, the age group most affected by censorship software. The Internet thrives and is fundamentally based on ones right to freedom of speech. Without freedom of speech and expression, there would be no Internet, or certainly nothing like the Internet that is known today. Those fighting to censor the Internet need to look outside themselves and their personal agendas and be thankful that they have the right to access information about anything that interests them. When censorship is introduced "anything" becomes impossible. Further reading The Internet Censorship FAQ Peacefire.org The Blue Ribon Campaign Internet Free Expression Alliance