30 September 2019 — WSWS
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern used her visit to New York for the United Nations General Assembly to accelerate global efforts to censor the internet. Her government is playing a leading role in exploiting the March 15 Christchurch terrorist attack to promote international mechanisms to block or take down online material that governments deem “extremist.”
22 September 2019 — True Publica
This article is part of a series dedicated to a significant and wide-reaching BigBrotherWatch publication focusing on state surveillance that has been largely ignored by the mainstream media. Today, it is a very serious worry that our entire mechanism of democracy is being undermined by excessive and uncontrolled state surveillance. This disproportionate obsession by the government inhibits the fundamental ability of campaigners such as human rights activists, civil liberty experts and even local non-violent protestors to exercise their rights and has the potential to stall social change.
12 September 2019 — Caitlin Johnson
Twitter has suspended multiple large Cuban media accounts for reasons the social media platform has yet to explain as of this writing, a move which journalist Dan Cohen has described as “the equivalent of silencing CNN, Fox, WaPo and NPR’s accounts” for that nation. The Union of Cuban Journalists has denounced the move as censorship.
19 September 2019 — WSWS
Several recent media reports have pointed to the rise of government Internet shutdowns internationally as a mechanism of censorship, repression and control in response to growing political turmoil and mass protests. Based largely on data maintained by Access Now—an organization that “defends and extends the digital rights of users at risk around the world”—these reports show a trend of dramatically accelerating Internet shutdowns over the past three years.
6 September 2019 — WSWS
The US military has issued a call for research proposals from technology partners for the development of an automated system capable of scanning the entire internet and locating and censoring content deemed as “false media assets” and “disinformation.” According to government documents, the requested solution would provide “innovative semantic technologies for analyzing media” that will help “identify, deter, and understand adversary disinformation campaigns.”
4 September 2019 — Off Guardian
CJ Hopkins
If you want a vision of the future, don’t imagine “a boot stamping on a human face — for ever,” as Orwell suggested in 1984. Instead, imagine that human face staring mesmerized into the screen of some kind of nifty futuristic device on which every word, sound, and image has been algorithmically approved for consumption by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (“DARPA”) and its “innovation ecosystem” of “academic, corporate, and governmental partners.”
23 August 2019 — RT
YouTube has disabled 210 channels for posting content related to the Hong Kong protests “in a coordinated manner,” following in the footsteps of Facebook and Twitter in restricting its arbitrary censorship to pro-China accounts.
21 August 2019 — WSWS
Twitter revealed on Monday that it had shut down 200,000 accounts that it claimed “originated in China,” over posts relating to the ongoing mass protests of workers and youth in Hong Kong. The purge is one of the largest in the history of the platform.
19 August 2019 — The Electronic Intifada
UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn delivers his keynote speech at the party’s conference in Liverpool last September. The party approved and then apparently revoked the press pass for The Electronic Intifada’s Asa Winstanley to cover this year’s conference. Credit: Phil Noble Reuters
Last month, the Labour Party approved a press pass for The Electronic Intifada’s Asa Winstanley to cover its annual conference next month.
But last week the UK opposition party’s press team claimed in an email to Winstanley that “Your application has not been approved.”
17 August 2019 — RT
FILE PHOTO: Banner protesting against ‘Google Campus’ construction in Berlin, August 17, 2018 © AFP / John MacDougall
Modern censorship is more dangerous than open totalitarianism, it being concealed and incorporated in our daily routine, says Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, commenting on the insider leak detailing Google’s news blacklist.
11 August 2019 — Truthout – Common Dreams
Civil liberties groups are warning of a major threat to online freedoms and First Amendment rights if a leaked draft of a Trump administration edict—dubbed by critics as a “Censor the Internet” executive order that would give powerful federal agencies far-reaching powers to pick and choose which kind of Internet material is and is not acceptable—is allowed to go into effect.
Sunday, 11 August 2019 — 21st Century Wire
As British ambassador to the US Kim Darroch tended his wounds of humiliation last month, following the leak of a cache of diplomatic cables and documents, including emails describing President Trump as ‘inept’ and ‘uniquely dysfunctional,’ an outraged UK government descended into panic over how to handle such an apparently sensitive and damaging betrayal of confidential information. A police investigation was launched to find the leaker.
Is this dubious leak now being used to mount an attack on whistleblowers – with the help of Boris Johnson’s new Home Secretary, Priti Patel?
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