HUA HIN, Thailand - As the nations of Asia
strive to compete with their Western counterparts
in terms of economic prowess and technological
advancement, a new battlefield is forming - and it
lies in cyberspace. The battle is not between
corporate giants for the next big deal, but
between governments and the people fighting for
their rights of freedom of speech online.
The Internet, since its birth in the
mainstream in the late 1970s, has grown to become
the most powerful communication tool the
world has known. But with
that power comes a danger - an overwhelming sense
of control by some of the less democratic
governments of the region.
Censorship of
the Internet is becoming alarmingly commonplace
among countries whose leadership depends on
controlling the popular world view. Along with the
desire to control comes a sense of fear and
foreboding over the unknowns that lie in
cyberspace, and more taxpayer's money is being
spent on suppressing it today than ever before.
One interesting statistic (from The Financial
Times) is that eight of the top 10 most heavily
censored countries are in Asia.
Myanmar
tops the list, according to Business Week, with
the military junta going to such extreme measures
to control the 'Net as taking screenshots every
five minutes from computers connected from
Internet cafes (the only viable method of getting
online in the country). US software is also used
to block opposition websites, and with the junta
owning all of the country's newspapers, radio and
television, media operators have no option but to
toe the line - or face lengthy jail terms.
North Korea is also pretty high up the
list, with leader Kim Jong-il retaining absolute
control over the Internet and rest of the
country's media. Only a handful of citizens are
permitted to go online, and when they do, they are
faced with the choice of about 40 websites, most
of which are loaded with government propaganda
supplied by the official Korean Central News
Agency.
The source of censorship
technology and application for both of these
countries is the king of Internet repression:
China. Often described as the pioneer of Internet
censorship, China devotes more resources than any
other country to the restraint of online autonomy.
The primary themes tend to be websites containing
content on democracy, Taiwan and Tibet, and
websites belonging to outlawed groups, such as
Falungong. The Chinese leadership have even gone
to the length of blocking websites that appear in
Google search-results pages for terms such as
"freedom", "revolution" and "democracy". The
censors will often also block an entire site if
only a small part of it is deemed to contain
sensitive information.
A 30,000-strong
"Internet police task force" constantly monitors
the 'Net for critical comments appearing on
forums, blogs and portals. The Chinese Edition of Asia
Times Online often comes under the hammer of the
people's censorship machine.
High-tech
methods of control include the famous "Great
Firewall of China", a common name given to the
US$800 million Golden Shield Project owned by
China's Ministry of Public Security. The project
was started in 1998 with the primary goal of
constructing a communication network and computer
information system for police to improve their
capability and efficiency. Content is blocked by
the system's ability to prevent IP (Internet
protocol) addresses being routed through with
selective DNS (domain name server) poisoning,
which fools a server into believing it has
received authentic information. In short, the
system acts as a large-scale filter with an entire
database of blocked keywords, websites and
addresses; it monitors all Web traffic in and out
of China, including e-mail.
A relative
newcomer to the Internet-suppressing nations of
Asia is Thailand. With more than 40,000 websites
blocked, the majority in the past six months, it
is evident that the Thai authorities are looking
to their neighbors for the way forward in
controlling what people look at when they go
online. Initially, Internet censorship in Thailand
targeted adult websites and pornography, but in a
rapidly increasing trend since the coup last
September 19, more and more websites critical of
the junta, the monarchy or the Buddhist religion
have disappeared from public view within the
kingdom.
By last October, the Thai
Ministry of Information and Communication
Technology had blocked 2,475 websites; by January
11 this number had risen to 13,435, a jump of more
than 400%. According to the Freedom Against
Censorship Thailand group, "2007 may well be the
21st century's '1984' in Thailand", as the MICT
has been granted a budget of more than US$100
million for Internet censorship and control.
Websites regarding the sensitive political
situation in Thailand's Muslim south are also
blocked, including any in support of the Patani
United Liberation Organization (PULO), a banned
faction that works for a separate Muslim state, or
similar organizations. Anything regarding Thaksin
Shinawatra, the prime minister deposed in the
September coup, also faces censorship, along with
a number of Thai Web boards, including the popular
Pantip.com, allowing political discussion. These
now need to be heavily moderated if they want to
remain online in the kingdom.
The case
that made international news was the blocking of
Google's video-sharing website YouTube in April
for violation of the kingdom's strict lese
majeste laws and publishing video clips deemed
offensive to the revered monarchy.
Last
week Reuters reported that YouTube had agreed to
remove four clips that Thailand says insulted
their king. Communications Minister Sitthichai
Pookaiyaudom received a letter from Google's
senior lawyer, Kent Walker, stating that Thailand
had sent YouTube management a list of 12 video
clips it deemed offensive; six of those had
already been removed by their creators. The Thai
politician, who had already threatened to sue
Google, said he no longer wished to take legal
action but did not comment on unblocking the
website in Thailand.
The Thai government
is now attempting to track down and prosecute the
individuals who uploaded the clips. Meanwhile,
YouTube remained blocked in its entirety at the
time of writing.
Thailand was ranked 107
out of 164 by Reporters Without Borders' worldwide
press-freedom index 2005, a drop of 48 places from
the previous ranking of 59th in 2004. Only last
week the National Legislative Assembly approved a
new Cyber Crime Bill that outlaws any attempt to
get around government censors, usually carried out
with the use of a proxy server that masks the IP
address of the blacklisted website by making the
request for its clients. Most proxy websites are
also blocked in Thailand.
A number of
Middle Eastern nations employ strict Internet
censorship policies for religious dissent. These
include Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Syria, Saudi
Arabia and Iran. The Internet often comes under
the sole control of countries with a "one-man
show" dictatorial policy that churns out nothing
but propaganda from the national media. President
Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan is a primary example
according to a report by the Committee to Protect
Journalists in 2006, as was Saparmurat Atayevich
Niyazov, the president of Turkmenistan who died
last December.
Human Rights Watch reports
that Iran, which is undergoing an Internet boom,
has seen a sharp rise in the popularity of
blogging. However, an already long list of blocked
websites and weblogs continues to grow. Many
involve women's rights, opinion, and political or
religious discussion. The Iranian government has
been known to arrest bloggers for their comments
on websites, and in 2004 and 2005, a number of
Iranians were imprisoned for blogging, including
Mojtaba Saminejad, then 23, who was given a
two-year sentence for comments against Supreme
Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
As
technology advances and more Asian people gain
access to the information superhighway, the work
of government Internet censors is going to
increase as new websites appear and people want to
have their say. Censorship and repression will
eventually breed more insurrection as Web surfers
seek out ways to get their voices heard by the
global audience.
Martin J Young
is an Asia Times Online correspondent based in
Thailand.
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