TRAMPLING FREE SPEECH ALL OVER THE WORLD
Robin Kirk
News & Observer, NC
April 28 2007
DURHAM – When slavery opponents campaigned for abolition in the 1700s,
they used a printing press to mount the world’s first human rights
campaign. The dominant technology of the day contributed to an eventual
ban on the trans-Atlantic trade and later an end to slavery itself.
Today, the Internet is our printing press. Activists around the world
turn to e-mail, blogs, online video and Web pages to communicate.
But all is not well in cyberland.
On April 18, the World Organization of Human Rights USA filed suit
against Yahoo!, Inc., alleging the company provided information to
the Chinese authorities that led to the 2002 arrest and torture of
Internet user Wang Xiazoning.
According to the lawsuit, Xiazoning was no criminal. He used a Yahoo
e-mail account to circulate electronic journals and articles that
supported democratic reform and to communicate with other democracy
advocates.
Wang’s wife, Yu Ling, has said that her husband is being held in a
labor camp where he has been tortured.
U.S. law allows lawsuits against American companies that aid in human
rights abuses overseas. In 2004, for example, oil giant Unocal settled
a lawsuit brought by Burmese villagers who claimed they had suffered
forced relocation, forced labor, rape, torture and murder at the
hands of Burmese army units that defended a pipeline shared by Unocal.
It is surprising to see innovative, young technology companies in
the same dock as oil companies. While human rights activists madly
adapt to the Internet by blogging, posting video of violations on
YouTube and clogging legislators’ accounts with e-mails, censors and
the police are busy patrolling the virtual universe for nonviolent
protesters and human rights advocates.
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YAHOO! IS NOT ALONE. Yahoo! and Google have been roundly criticized
for signing a "Public Pledge on Self-discipline for the Chinese
Internet Industry" with the Chinese government, effectively turning
the companies, in the words of one human rights leader, from "an
information gateway to an information gatekeeper."
Microsoft and Skype block terms they believe the Chinese government
wants to censor. Cisco supplies the routers that allow the government
to divert Internet traffic away from references to the Tiananmen Square
massacre. China’s system of Internet censorship and surveillance,
popularly known as the "Great Firewall," is the most advanced in
the world.
China is not the only scoundrel. In March, an Egyptian appeals court
upheld a sentence of four years against Abdel Kareem Suliman Amer,
for "insulting Islam and the president of Egypt" for his pro-democracy
blog. And in a tantrum against YouTube, the government of Turkey last
month abruptly blocked the video service, where lurkers energetically
and sometimes profanely argue over Turkey’s unwillingness to recognize
the 1915 genocide of ethnic Armenians.
In a response to criticisms, Yahoo! has claimed that it is "following
local laws." But to claim "the law let me do it" is an evasion of a
company’s obligation to avoid actions that significantly contribute
to human rights abuses.
Like their counterparts in the actual world, Internet companies need
to adopt policies that promote freedom of speech and expression.
Specifically, companies should not store data from users exercising
basic rights such as freedom of expression in places where that data is
vulnerable to seizure. All companies should refuse to take on the role
of censors. If they are obligated to, they should make that obligation
clear to the users, who can then seek out alternative services.
And we, the users, need to make sure this happens, by contacting
these companies and expressing our views (even if we are wearing
blogger pajamas).
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ONE WAY TO PRESSURE COMPANIES is to use alternative services that have
better track records. Some companies and universities (like my own)
use Google as a default search engine, a choice that can be reviewed
with an eye toward encouraging the company to reform.
Student groups are circulating petitions to Internet giants urging
them to adopt tougher standards. Irrepressible.info, a campaign
launched by Amnesty International, is a good place to find out more.
Companies can also ensure that users in countries promoting censorship
have access to software like Anonymizer, which automatically migrates
sites blocked by censors and sends the updated addresses to users
via e-mail updates.
Abuses will happen, whether in sweatshops or the supercharged world
of the Internet. As they construct our future, Internet titans need
to understand they are neither immune from wrongdoing nor incapable
of making things right.
Paraphrasing that departed tyrant Mao Zedong: "Let a hundred blogs
bloom."
(Robin Kirk is a visiting lecturer at Duke University and
coordinator of the Duke Human Rights Initiative. She blogs at
)
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress