Category Archives: Censorship

A recent story by Caixin Magazine about a Chinese government crackdown on two public relations firms brought a couple of things to light: that the government no longer has a monopoly on media censorshipand that its actually a really good business.

Up until this past July, when the government threw 100 employees in jail, the companies in question were profiting handsomely from the post deletion business, the service of making unflattering things printed online simply go away.

According to the report by Caixin, which is one of Chinas best-regarded business magazines, these PR firms had developed a few different ways of doing this. One was to befriend search engine administrators who could tweak search results so that a keyword would fail to generate resultsmeaning, all the articles in which the keyword appeared simply wouldnt show up. But the best way to censor negative news about their clients was to buy off the reporters bosses. PR firms regularly bribed news editors to take down articles that they or their colleagues had commissioned in the first place.

And as this business turned out to be quite lucrativeone nervous government official paid the PR firm Yage Times 500,000 yuan ($80,400) for a single deletion projectthese PR firms had begun branching out. Their new line of business, reported Caixin, assigned employees to troll websites looking for negative news and, once they found some, to contact the relevant companies, citizens or government officials and conveniently offer them their services. But when finding articles proved to be just too much work, these firms started generating the bad press themselves, essentially turning the already crooked post-deletion industry into one of straight-up blackmail.

While it is unclear why the government launched the July crackdown,Caixin indicated that local government officials had been availing themselves of post-deletion services, which could possibly have something to do with it given the recent crackdown on corruption. An unnamed employee from Yage Times told the magazine that an estimated 60% of the companys profits came from government officials in small cities, as well as from police officers.

Theyll have no recourse now that the government has stamped out these types of servicesfor a time, at least. But as long as the government requires online media companies to enforce its elaborate censorship dragnet, this PR model is bound to surface again.

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Chinese government crackdown shows that its control over censorship is wearing thin

Chinese filmmakers must fight censorship even if it means removing their name from their own work, one-time banned Chinese director Lou Ye told AFP in an interview ahead of this month's Asian Film Awards in which his crime thriller "Mystery" has been nominated in six categories.

Banned in 2006 from filming in China for five years, Lou's latest picture tackles the subject of a new breed of wealthy and middle income men in post-socialist China for whom taking a mistress is the norm, in a practice that harks back to imperial China.

With nominations including best film, best director and best actress for Hao Lei's portrayal of a betrayed wife, "Mystery" begins with a violent death and tells the story of one man's double life.

"The film is about a very small group of people. It is about what happens between two women, the double life that this man leads, but through this I get to talk about things that happen in wider society," he said in Paris where the film was shown as part of a China programme at the city's Forum des Images in February.

"What is important to me is the way in which we see that all the protagonists are linked to the death of this young girl, the way that no-one can say this has nothing to do with me," he said.

According to Lou, having a mistress is now commonplace in China for anyone with sufficient means.

"Currently we see this way of life in particular among people who have money," he said adding that it was seen as a status symbol for men while a woman acting in the same way would be stigmatised.

The film is his second since the end of the ban imposed after he took his love story "Summer Palace", set around the taboo subject of the 1989 pro-democracy Tiananmen Square protests, to Cannes without official approval.

Lou responded by continuing to work, filming his next feature "Spring Fever" in secret using a handheld camera as well as "Love and Bruises" which came out after the ban expired.

Although now able to film in China again, Lou remains the subject of unwanted attention from censors.

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Keep up censorship fight, urges Chinese filmmaker

Sandy Hook Video Censorship
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PBS reports on OC Register censorship
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In a test case that could have significant implications for Google throughout Europe the company faced off against the Spanish data protection authority in the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg. One could frame the case as privacy vs. censorship.

From the Spanish governments point of view its data protection authority is simply vindicating the recently articulated right (of individuals) to be forgotten to have content or data about them removed from the search index upon request. From Googles perspective, if the court agrees with Spain, the outcome would be tantamount to granting individuals the right to censor Google.

A concise statement of the underlying facts of the case is provided by Reporters without Borders:

The AEPD rejected Costejas complaint against the newspaper on the grounds that the publication of the information was legal and was protected by the right to information but, with extraordinary inconsistency, upheld his complaint his complaint against Google, ordering the search engine to eliminate about 100 links from all future searches for Costejas name.

Google refused to accept the ruling and filed an appeal . . .

As Google indicated in its blog post, there are roughly 200 cases like this pending in Spain featuring individuals seeking to have content about them removed from search results.

As the factual summary above indicates, Spanish authorities decided that newspapers are protected from these individual takedown requests by a right to information or expression (free speech). However, Google is not being given the same treatment. This is true despite the fact that in earlierdecisions, Google was labeled a publisher for purposes of libel laws.

Google thus gets the liability treatment of a publisher without the corresponding freedom of expression protections accorded to newspapers.

Speaking with someone with knowledge of the European Court proceedings yesterday, I was told that the judges expressed skepticism about at least some of Spains arguments in the case. For example, Spain wants Google to remove the disputed information not just from its Spanish index but from all Google results globally.

I was told that a ruling may not come down for several months. And, like the US Supreme Court, the European judicial body could narrowly rule on the particular facts or broadly articulate principles around the right to be forgotten that might apply across Europe.

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Privacy Vs Censorship: Google, Spanish Government Face Off In European Courts

Even the most open, democratic governments have sought laws and new forms of surveillance that many see as a new wave of censorship -- and that includes the United States.

The U.S. government asked Google for data on its users more than 31,000 times in 2012 alone, for example. And the government rarely obtained a search warrant first, Google recently revealed; in nearly all cases, the company ended up turning over at least some data.

Some argue that heightened surveillance, restrictions on Internet freedom and even censorship are necessary to protect intellectual property rights, prevent cyberespionage, fight child pornography, and protect national interests such as nuclear power plants from hackers. And here the U.S. is far from alone.

"A number of democratic states have considered or implemented various restrictions in response to the potential legal, economic, and security challenges raised by new media," notes the Freedom House report "Freedom on the Net 2012."

Anxiety over online theft and cyberattacks is not unwarranted. Virtually every major U.S. company and media outlet has been a victim. Google was attacked back in 2009. Facebook, Apple and Microsoft revealed this month that hackers had breeched their defenses. And The New York Times and Wall Street Journal have fought off Chinese hackers for months. Indeed, dozens of countries have their own online hacking groups -- so-called cyber or asymmetrical warfare divisions.

- Freedom House report Freedom on the Net 2012

"It's been going on in China since at least May 2002," said Alan Paller, founder of the SANS Institute, an information security and training firm.

Consequently, lawmakers -- even President Obama in his State of the Union address -- have been motivated to take steps to stem the hacking tide. However, the road to better security could also stifle free speech.

When the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) met in Dubai in December, some 89 member countries including Russia, China, Cuba and Iran, supported a treaty that would give individual governments more control over the Internet's infrastructure.

Sensing a thinly veiled attempt to suppress dissent, 55 countries -- including Canada and the U.S. -- said no.

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BIG BROTHER? US Linked to Censorship, Surveillance on Internet

China's new leaders have inherited a rigorous system of censorship. There are few signs of change under the new leadership, although it is becoming increasingly difficult for the state to control information.

For readers, the New Year edition of the weekly magazine Nanfang Zhoumo was more of the same.

The lead article greeted them with the headline "Dreams are our commitment to do what is necessary." It also contained a quote from new Communist Party leader Xi Jinping: "The great revival in China has always been the great dream of the Chinese people."

Chinese newspapers are full of headlines and quotes like these. But editors at Nanfang Zhoumo were surprised when they saw the magazine in print. They had actually submitted another story for publication with a headline that read "The Chinese dream is a constitutional government."

Turning point?

Headlines like that one are hard to find in Chinese publications, if not impossible. The censor had changed it overnight.

But this time, the editorial team wasn't willing to accept the censorship and went on strike in protest.

"Censorship has become increasingly sophisticated in recent years," said Chang Ping, editor of the exile magazine iSun Affairs and a journalist at DW. Chinese authorities give detailed instructions to editors of how and what to report, he notes. With warnings and sanctions, they also try to prevent critical stories from being published. If journalists decide to publish such stories, they risk being fired, together with their editor.

Chang speaks from experience. He was a former editor-in-chief of Nanfang Zhoumo before he had to vacate his position after publishing a report that was critical of authorities.

Chang doesn't think anything will change in Chinese censorship under the new generation of leaders. "There's currently a lot of talk in China and abroad about a 'tipping point,'" he said. Despite this, Chang, is quick to add, there's also no clear evidence of this happening.

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The long arm of Chinese censorship

Google Inc. (GOOG) shouldnt have to remove content from its search engine that was lawfully published elsewhere, the company argued in a case at the European Unions top court that will set boundaries between freedom of expression and data-protection rights.

The operator of the worlds largest search engine isnt a data controller, it is a mere intermediary in terms of the data which it indexes, Google lawyer Francisco Enrique Gonzalez-Diaz told a panel of 15 judges at the EU Court of Justice hearing today. Direct requests for personal information to be removed from a search engine -- even if it was put online by a newspaper -- would be a fundamental shift of responsibility from the publisher to the search engine and would amount to censorship.

The dispute raises questions about the scope of EU privacy rules when it comes to personal data on the Internet; the rights of search engines to use any online data to remain commercially successful; and who ultimately is in charge of what happens with the data. The Luxembourg-based courts ruling will be binding on courts across the 27-nation bloc.

The case was triggered by about 200 instances of Spains data-protection authority ordering Google to remove information on people. The information in todays case concerned a Spanish man whose house was auctioned off for failing to pay taxes. Newspaper La Vanguardia published the information in 1998 and years later it could still be found via a Google search.

In this case and in many other cases, serious harm is done to individuals, Joaquin Munoz Rodriguez, a lawyer representing the man, told the EU court. The information is tracked and ordered by Google and contains, to a very large extent, personal data.

Google is liable because it allows easy and quick access to information that wasnt easily found online before, he said.

Google faces privacy investigations around the world as it adds services and steps up competition with Facebook Inc. (FB) for users and advertisers. The Mountain View, California-based company created a uniform set of privacy policies last year for more than 60 products, unleashing criticism from regulators and consumer advocates over whether it was properly protecting data.

People shouldnt be prevented from learning that a politician was convicted of taking a bribe, or that a doctor was convicted of malpractice, Google said in a blog post. The substantive question before the court today is whether search engines should be obliged to remove links to valid legal material.

Data protection is currently policed by separate regulators across the EU. The blocs executive body wants to simplify the system so companies deal with only one.

A lawyer for the European Commission, the EUs executive, argued today that Google does control data. That view diverges from an opinion of a group representing the blocs data- protection watchdogs, which said search engines are generally not to be held primarily responsible for content.

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Google Cites Censorship Risk in EU Data Control Lawsuit

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Unnecessary Censorship in Smite part 2.
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Unnecessary Censorship in Smite part 2. - Video