The Internet should be censored

Key Word Approach:

What is the Internet? (do not focus on this aspect too much) What is censorship? Denial or Control or Suppression of either (a) access to information (already available) or (b) publishing information on the Internet What kind of sites / information on the Internet is censored? Porn Paedophilia Search Engines like Google or defence sensitive sites like Google Maps / Google Earth Social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter WikiLeaks YouTube Political Blogs / Web sites Religious Blogs / Web sites Racist material like Nazi or anti-Semitic or anti-any race propaganda File-sharing Web sites How is it done? Explicit - Installing software like firewall and proxy sites While doing this, the govt or the censoring authority will prepare a list (sometimes made public) of what to ban (like selected content or complete sites) and accordingly censor.

Implicit often reflected through pages like 404 error page cannot be displayed. In this case a list is prepared but not published (not made public); however, the ISPs are asked to deny access to sites on the prepared list.

Who does it?

 Governments Educational Institutes Libraries Parents Employers Companies Why is it done? Three major reasons Politics and Power - Censorship directed at political opposition to the ruling government is
common in authoritarian and repressive regimes. Some countries block Web sites related to religion and minority groups, often when these movements represent a threat to the ruling regimes. Examples include political blogs,

Lese-Majesty - is the crime of violating the dignity of the sovereign head of state.
Morocco, Thailand, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the Arab monarchies are examples where Lese-Majesty is in vogue and there is a significant censorship by the state on the internet.

Governments in national interest to protect national security. National borders are more permeable in the online world is often why this is done. However servers are often located in other countries and countries have no jurisdiction or control over them. In such cases technical censorship is resorted to through site blocking and content filtering. However with servers changing locations quickly it is difficult to resort to a static method of blocking Search engines like Google are censored in China. In addition China enforces strict censorship on democracy and other related search words (post Tiananmen Square incident) through an elaborate state run censorship system. North Korea and Cuba exercise complete control over the internet and are therefore able to block out most content on the internet Arab Spring Internet access severely curtailed in Egypt during the protests for democracy. The Syrian government has launched a severe clampdown on the Internet to limit the organisation of protests and to stop dissemination of information on the atrocities perpetrated by state forces in their effort to quell it. To enforce Social Norms and Moral Policing - Social filtering is censorship of topics that are
held to be antithetical to accepted societal norms. In particular censorship of child pornography and to protect children enjoys very widespread public support and such content is subject to censorship and other restrictions in most countries.
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Educational Institutes like schools and colleges to protect children from accessing information / material deemed not fit for their viewing / reading; also sometimes they resort to censorship to deny access to social networking sites as they distract students from study. Parents to protect children from falling prey to paedophilia; also to done to keep vulnerable children away from unwanted material / information (like porn or adult stuff) Security Concerns - Internet filtering related to threats to national security that targets the
Web sites of insurgents, extremists, and terrorists often enjoys wide public support. Security concerns from the point of view of Intellectual property and economic interests also prompt many organisations to enforce internet censorship

National Security Examples include blocking of pro-North Korean sites by South Korea, bocking sites related to the Balochi independence movement by Pakistan, blocking of sites of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Middle East, Employers to protect company interests by not allowing employees from accessing filesharing sites so that they cant transfer large amounts of data; also a company may deny employees access to Instant Messengers (like Yahoo! Messenger and Google Talk) and email sites (like Gmail) as they run the risk of lowering productivity. Companies to protect Intellectual Property Rights. What does it entail? Affects freedom of speech Violates freedom of publishing info Violates freedom to access information

VAP and SPELT

Articulate views of all involved (listed above) on whether it should be censored or not If not outright censorship, then regulate? How do you separate censorship from regulation? There is a thin line separating them, depending on which side you happen to be. Is it ok to deny access in the name of political and religious ideologies of a few people/groups in power? What about the society at large? Is letting the public remain ignorant in national interest? By censoring Internet, are we not doing more harm in the longer run? Does it not stifle innovation and creativity? Can everything on the Internet be censored by anyone?

Not always? What about availability of technology? Also the cost involved? What about Web sites registered in foreign lands and available on proxy servers?