Global Voices Advocacy » Alexey Sidorenko

Controversy Over the Internet Governance Forum's 2012 Venue

Alexey Sidorenko — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 13:23:09 +0000

As the 6th Internet Governance Forum is about to close its doors, controversy has emerged over the next venue.

Plenary session in Nairobi. Flickr photo by Franck K.

It has already been decided that the next IGF will be hosted by Azerbaijan, an oil-rich country in the South Caucasus.

The venue has not been discussed in a multi-stakeholder way (including not only governments and businesses but also civil society). And it is those who were excluded from the decision who have the most concerns about Azerbaijan.

Below are the main pros and cons of holding the IGF in Azerbaijan that civil society participants have discussed offline, on the margins and in the halls of this year's forum:

Pros:

Tunisia hosted the World Summit on the Information Society (the precursor to the Internet Governance Forum) in 2005. What happened five years later is widely known. The supporters of holding the IGF in Azerbaijan say that the IGF's multi-stakeholder model of discussion can actually trigger democratization processes and better electronic engagement among the netizens and bloggers. Yet, there's no hard evidence to prove that the Internet Governance Forum in 2005 had any direct impact on Tunisian digitalised civil society.
The geographical and diplomatic advantages. Activists from Iran could come to the IGF and present their view on the development of the Internet.

Cons:

The main argument by those who are skeptical about the next IGF venue is that Azerbaijan is not a democratic country. According to Freedom House, an American human rights organization, Azerbaijan is a not free country both in terms of press freedom and in terms of democracy, and is only a “partly free” country in terms of Online Freedom. Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan, had been called ‘the Predator’ of the Internet by Reporters Without Borders, a French human rights NGO (read the list of online media crackdowns). Global Voices has continuously reported the crackdowns on social media exercised by the Azeri government.
Another issue is the possibility for travel of all parties and all representatives from all over the world. Due to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Armenians can't enter Azerbaijan unless they receive a direct invitation from the Azeri Ministry of Foreign Affairs and can afford bodyguards. There are reports that people who travel to Armenia and later come to Azerbaijan are questioned about the purpose of their visits to Armenia.
Logistical issues also concerns. The experts doubt Baku's capacity to provide enough affordable hotel accomodation during the Forum.
Combined, these factors pose a challenge to the continuity of the IGF process.

(Editor's note: This post was corrected on October 3rd to clarify that the World Summit on the Information Society was held in Tunis in 2005, not the IGF.)

Key Quotes and Tweets from the Internet Governance Forum

Alexey Sidorenko — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 10:52:27 +0000

As the Internet Governance Forum is a truly epic event both in the online and in the offline world, it's really hard to do justice to the whole complexity of the discussions and debates that are taking place amongst hundreds of representatives from governments, companies, civil society, the technical community, and grassroots activists who have gathered for four days in Nairobi, Kenya.

Therefore, in true Global Voices fashion, let me share some key quotes tweets from participants accompanied by short commentaries. (Note: some quotations might not be 100% precise.)

United Nations Office in Nairobi. Photo by Alexey Sidorenko

1. Remi Caron, a Dutch cloud computing entrepreneur:

Data Schengen agreement could be very beneficial!

Comment: Remi said that it's really easy to break various European laws in the course of providing and using third-party cloud storage across European borders. In order not to criminalize cloud data, an international agreement is needed.

2. Open letter signed by Civil Society and Internet Governance Caucus and 9 other NGOs about the Russia/China proposed Cyber-security code of conduct:

[...] What we miss in the proposed code of conduct is any reference to the multistakeholder approach, established by the Tunis Agenda as best practice in internet policymaking, and the role of civil society in strengthening the security and stability of the Internet as proposed by the Code of Conduct. [...]

3. A debate on DNS filtering:

@JosephOwino DNS blocking of illegal online content is like curing a disease with pain killers! :p

Comment by Dan McQuillan:

yes, because you get addicted!

Comment: The panel on content blocking, held for the most part by government representatives, didn't fully reflect the multi-stakeholder approach. The dominant discourse didn't even question the need for content blocking or removal, automatically assuming that there is some content that needs to be either blocked or removed.

4. Twitterer @Tadtel:

Amazed by Kenya's 3G prices. Paid USD 10 for 1 week of unlimited 3G access.Safaricom coverage throughout Maasai

Comment: the development of Kenyan ICT is incredible (at least on a technological level) – 3 backbone cables connect the country to the global Web, and 1 more is in the development. The locals, however, point out that the bottleneck is not in the backbone – rather it is in compute illiteracy.

5. Burt Kaliski, Director of the EMC Innovation Network:

not only the attack, the defense can also be distributed – through the cloud. The Cloud can absorb the threat.

Comment: speaking of the advantages of cloud computing and the Internet's future security challenges.

6. Amr Gharbeia, Egyptian social media activist, and now Technology and Freedoms Programme Officer at Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights

Facebook and twitter are social tools. *We* are the social network.

Comment: the Arab Spring and the much-debated mobilisation power of social networks have brought a huge wave of preventative regulation, and frankly speaking, pure fear among governments. The threat, however, is not the social networks, but the empowered citizens of the new world.

7. Panelist at panel on ccTLD's (country code top-level domain names like .uk, .cn, or .ru) :

There are 3 main trends in #ccTLD: Growth, growth, growth

Comment: the discussion about Internationalised Domain Names (IDN) and ccTLD's were discussed in positive, excited tones. The question of the balkanization and the fragmentation of the Internet was not debated.

8. Larry Strickling, U.S. Department of Commerce:

We can choose to expand bureaucracies or we can expand jobs…The future of the Internet is at risk. The multi-stakeholder model is being challenged.

Comment: probably the most important debate of this IGF: the model of Internet governance is being challenged not only by the ‘usual suspects’ (China, Russia, etc who simply disregard the multi-stakeholder model in preference of the governance made through inter-government agreements) but also the European Union who argue for a more important role of the national governments in the decision-making process.

9. Vint Cerf, co-creator of the TCP/IP protocol and a person commonly known as the ‘father of the Internet':

We need common agreements – what is acceptable and what is unacceptable behavior on the network. This has a great deal to do with ethics.

Comment: the search of the balance of the regulation and the self-regulation is a leading idea of the IGF11. How can our global society make the Internet a space that is simultaneously secure, innovative and free? There are no easy answers.

(Editor's note: To learn more about the IGF, an annual multi-stakeholder meeting to discuss key issues related to the Internet's future now in its sixth year, see the Netizen's Guide to the Internet Governance Forum.)

Russia: Anothr Kemerovo Blogger Sued For Libelling

Alexey Sidorenko — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 14:45:59 +0000

A criminal case has been started against Kemerovo-based Alexander Sorokin (aka LJ-user commentator40), Echo Moskvy reported [RUS]. Sorokin is accused of libel against Kemerovo governor Aman Tuleev [EN] for the post [RUS] in which he compares Russian regional governors to Latin American dictators. It is the second loud case [EN] of blogger prosecution in this region in 2010.

Russia: The First Case of YouTube Ban

Alexey Sidorenko — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 13:44:39 +0000

YouTube under fire in the Russia's Far East. Photo by mauritsonline

On July 16, 2010, Komsomolsk-on-Amur city court issued a decision [RUS] requested by the city prosecutor. The decision requires a local Internet provider “Rosnet” to block IP-addresses of five websites: lib.rus (the judge meant lib.rus.ec, a Russian Internet library), thelib.ru, www.zhurnal.ru, web.archive.org, and… youtube.com.

The court believes those websites host extremist content (several online copies of “Mein Kampf” and a video “Russia for Russians” that accompanied a skinhead-related song uploaded by a user from Serbia [RUS]) while the provider was accused of “not blocking them.” The court decision says:

…the inspection conducted by the Prosecutor's Office showed that the Internet provider (the defendant) failed to ensure the security of the users of the global network properly. Komsomolsk-on-Amur residents have free access to extremist and terrorist websites that promote ideas of public organizations, contain statements aimed at inciting hatred and hostility towards a group of people based on ethnicity, attitude towards religion, as well as belonging to the authorities, and justification of the terrorist activities prohibited on the territory of the Russian Federation.
[…]
in order to restore the violated rights of the citizens and to enforce the current law, access… to the Internet sites … should be limited by adding rules of the IP-filtration of the aforementioned websites to the router.

Marker.ru published [RUS] an interview with prosecutor Vladimir Pakhomov, who said that “a provider is obliged to filter information that goes through its channels to the World Wide Web,” and didn't exclude the possibility of filtering Vkontakte.ru and other social networks.

The court's decision, however, hasn't been enforced yet. The provider managed to appeal [RUS] on time and is waiting for the decision of a higher instance court.

Numerous mistakes (both spelling and factual) in the court decision attracted attention [RUS] of various bloggers, highlighting a low level of computer (and general) literacy of a person who wrote the decision. Besides, the measure of IP-filtering is both expensive and inefficient (for various reasons), argued Rosnet in a detailed press release published on its website. Russian Google said [RUS] the decision might be a serious threat for the development of the Internet in Russia's Far East.

Previously, GV reported on other cases of similar accusations against providers (here, here, and here/a>, and many others that were not documented). Until now, however, prosecutors have been demanding to close only small websites. With YouTube, the technique of content removal/blocking was slightly different. The Russian authorities addressed YouTube directly with demands to delete certain videos, and the service usually complied [RUS].

“Rosnet” cited [RUS] two similar cases that were initiated but lost by the same Prosecutor's Office in April and May 2010. Recently, Sova-center reported on a court decision in Chita region, also in the Far East Region: Chita city court obliged a local provider to block the website of “Russian Zabaikalie” because of the neo-Nazi content. Both Chita and Komsomolsk-on-Amur are within 200-300 kilometers from the border with China, a country with the most severe Internet filtering systems. Besides, Komsomolsk-on-Amur has some of the highest Internet prices [EN] and some of the lowest numbers of social network users among cities with the population of more than 200,000 people.

So what is it? Is it geographical proximity that makes blocking practices so tempting, or a technical backwardness? Or, a general trend towards a nation-wide system of content blocking? Stupidity of the local authorities or the beginning of the Great Russian Firewall?

Both, concludes Anton Nossik, IT entrepreneur and a popular blogger. In his column at snob.ru, where Nossik analyzed [RUS] the unusual expansion of the list of extremist materials [RUS] (which grew from 218 items in 2008 to almost 700 now), he quite cynically writes about such prosecution of “extremism”:

The master plan made it down to the level of executives, who actually didn't have any motivation for ideological control. So the system started working on the order from the bosses… The police and the prosecutor's office got an [overall plan] that foresaw the exposure of extremist materials on the territory they control, virtual or real. … “experts” appeared, who were ready to replicate assessments recognizing as extremist any material they received from their [superiors]. The practice of issuing court decisions also became routine. Novosibirsk region's Federal Security Service was the first one to try out the idea of demanding IP-filtration of banned servers from local providers four years ago […].

[…]

As a result of all this mess, the country got a significant and absurd production line. The federal list of extremist materials, as well as the recent decision to ban YouTube in Komsomolsk-on-Amur are its products. Thousands of police officers, prosecutors and court employees are involved in the work of this production line all over the country. All these people couldn't care less about freedom of speech or about suppressing it, but they all have a plan, and [every three months] they have to report about the completed work. And we have what we have: a pile of absurd and inefficint bans with zero practical result – be it in the fight against extremism or even local limiting of access to the censored works. All this futile activity is being carried out only for appearance's sake, for paperwork. And the main stimulus for the local bureaucrats that could explain the high level of activity in this direction is the extraordinary simplicity of all these procedures, the ease of reporting a successfully-fulfilled job, and no control whatsoever of its usefulness and efficiency from the above.

Nossik concluded that Russia's police “are able to bury any disgusting totalitarian idea,” be it censorship or total surveillance. Although the reality described by Nossik is somewhat true, the case of the first YouTube ban in Russia is the result of a steady and consistent development. Blog or video platforms (like YouTube) are becoming more dangerous for individual bloggers, since the attempts to ban LiveJournal or Facebook after they hosted questionable material are becoming increasingly probable.

Russia: Website Closed By Police Order

Alexey Sidorenko — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 12:54:55 +0000

20marta.ru, an opposition website dedicated to the “Day of Anger” held on March 20, was closed by police after just one day of functioning, kasparov.ru reported. According to the source, the police have sent the letter informing that the website is closed due to inciting anti-government sentiment.

Uzbekistan: Criminal Charges Filed Against Documentary Photographer Umida Akhmedova

Alexey Sidorenko — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 19:55:37 +0000

Umida Akhmedova, photo by Fergana.ru

Umida Akhmedova, the Uzbek [EN] documentary photographer, has been accused of insult and slander against Uzbek people and traditions, reports Fergana.ru [EN]. The maximum penalty for these charges includes remedial work on two up to three years or detention for up to six months.

According to Umida Akhmedova, captain Nodir Akhmadzhanov, investigator of the Tashkent [EN] city police department, told her that the criminal charges have been filed against all local authors who cooperated with the Gender Program of the Swiss Embassy. Akhmedova is incriminated in the production of “Women and men: from dawn till dusk” photo album [EN - phtos], produced in 2007 under support of Swiss Embassy Gender Program, writes Fergana.ru. There's no information on other authors against whom the charges were filed. The website continues:

The investigator explained Umida Akhmedova that the case against her was produced, based on conclusions of Tashkent public prosecutor’s office experts, noting that the album “is the insult and slander of Uzbek people”. At the same time, it is absolutely unclear which photo (not the photomontage, not the screen version) may be “slander” or “insult”. It is also not clear who and when authorized Uzbek agency for press and information, the state structure, to represent the outraged honor of Uzbek people.

Umida Akhmedova shared first time she was called by police on November 17. Captain Nodir Akhmadzhanov invited her to Mirabad RDIA to give the report of witness on her “Women and men: from dawn to dusk” album. The investigator interviewed Umida for two hours and asked questions, related to Akhmedova’s participation in the production of photo album and as such movies as “Men and women: rites and ritual” and “The burden of virginity” EN] (Torrent can be downloaded here [RU]).

International society of photographers and artists reacted by issuing a petition in defence of Akhmedova [Google Translation - EN]. In the letter of “Protest and Anger” International Coalition of Journalists “Caucasia” expressed extreme disturbance with the fact of charges.

Весь сюжет – пример мракобесия и отката от демократических стандартов, к которым, на словах, так тяготеет Узбекистан. Весь мир хорошо знает, что Программа Швейцарского посольства – это комплекс гуманитарных, образовательных и просветительских проектов. Надо подчеркнуть, что Умида Ахмедова – одна из авторов, сотрудничавших с Программой на протяжении последних лет. Она участвовала также в ряде других международных программ и проектов. Мы, ее коллеги, знаем Умиду не только как талантливого автора, но и как истинную патриотку своей страны. Благодаря работам Умиды, Узбекистан узнали и полюбили тысячи людей в мире.

The whole story is an example of obscurantism and the rollback of democratic standards, which are so praised, in words only, by the Uzbekistan government. The whole world knows that the program of the Swiss embassy is a complex of humanitarian, educational and outreach projects. It must be emphasized that Umida Akhmedova is one of the authors who collaborated with the Program in recent years. She has also participated in several international programs and projects. We, her colleagues know Umida not only as a talented author, but as a true patriot of her country. Thanks to Umida's work, lots of people around the world found out about Uzbekistand and loved this country.

So far about 400 signatures have been collected from dozens of countries. The news of the criminal charges against Akhmedova reached the Russian-speaking blogosphere on December 17, while the event is almost not covered by English-speaking media.

Lj-user vaskodagala says [Google translation - EN] such advocacy campaigns can really help people and asks everyone to sign the petition. The last time it was campaign to get Umida Niyazova out of the jail and out of the country (Coverage of the campaign is available here [EN]). Vaskodagala claims she personally knows Akhmedova and couldn't believe the thing will get that bad:

Но я думала, с нашей Умидой такого не случится – хоть кого заболтает и рассмешит, какое там ей дело пришьешь, Господи? Я так думала. Ан нет. Месяц мы с ней выжидали – она говорила, подожди, мож угомонятся. Год назад у нас был такой сюжет в Кыргызстане – тогда угомонились, точно. А тут нет – Умидку нашу из разряда свидетелей перевели в обвиняемые. И круг сужают – на пустейшем, подчеркну, месте. Национальные традиции она им оклеветала.

But I thought it cannot happen to our Umida – she can make laugh everyone, oh Lord, what can one accuse her of? I thought so. But not now. We waited for a month – she said: ‘wait, maybe they will calm down'. We had almost the same story in Kyrgyzstan a year ago – then we managed to settle things down. But not now – Umida's status was changed from the witnesses to the accused. And they narrow down the circle – on absolutely no basis. You see, she slandered their national traditions.

The petition can be signed here [Google Translation - EN].

Many bloggers who discuss Akhmedova's case ask themselves how it is that a documentary photographer can defame her own people and traditions by making pictures. Moreover, it's absolutely absurd, that a person who in fact documents lives is accused of falsifying them.

Akhmedova's pictures are touching and unusual. They carefully depict the everyday life of Uzbek society. Here are just couple of them.

Uzbek children sitting in crocks, photo by Umida Ahmedova. Courtesy of Fergana.ru

A Girl By The Window, photo by Umida Akhmedova, courtesy of Fergana.ru

More pictures are available at Fergana.ru [RU]

***
Umida Akhmedova's bio (according to UZSCI)
Born on 21.10.1955 in Parkent [RU], Uzbekistan
1977 – 1981 – Study in Community College, city of Vladimir, Russia
1981 – 1986 – Study in the All-Russian State University of Cinematography [EN], Moscow, Russia
1970 – 1990 – operator at the Uzbek Newsreel
2000 – present – member of the creative union of the Academy of Fine Arts

Russia: Blogger Arrested For Pneumonic Plague Rumors

Alexey Sidorenko — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 12:08:03 +0000

Ivan Peregorodiev, a 22-year-old medical student and blogger, has been arrested on December 3 for spreading rumors about pneumonic plague in the city of Saratov. Authorities accused him of disseminating false information related to an act of terrorism. On December 2, the Russian bloggers actively discussed allegations that a large population of Saratov had been infected with H1N1 virus. The rumors said that authorities concealed many fatalities caused by the swine flu and the whole city was about to be closed for quarantine [RUS]. Later, people started talking about alleged cases of pneumonic plague blaming them on a local “anti-plague” research institute. The situation became so serious that Saratov Governor Pavel Ipatov [ENG] interrupted his visit to Belarus and returned to the city to deal with public outcry. Citing a post from a Russian social news Web site, Ivan Peregorodiev, aka lj-user iperegorodiev (his account is currently suspended), challenged an official statement that dismissed any possibility of pneumonic plague:

Turns out we may have a plague. “The results of the autopsy of people that died of swine flu – that became publicly available – caused panic. According to witnesses, the results of lung destruction resembled the cases of pneumonic plague described in medical literature.” (http://smi2.ru/saratoff/c243648) [RUS] Do our authorities tell the truth when they dismiss this information? Today they plan to spray disinfectant solution against pneumonic plague from helicopters… P.S. And here is another one http://www.epidemiolog.ru/prof/index.php?SECTION_ID=&ELEMENT_ID=3868 [RUS]

He followed up with another post just hours after the first one:

What is going on? Gentlemen, here is the latest news from an epidemic station: helicopters are loaded with disinfectant solution. P.S. Plots of American movies about the Apocalypse become reality.

The city officials denied any rumors about the plague but confirmed 17 fatal cases of swine flu. The authorities also admitted that city hospitals were overcrowded and Saratov's budget did not have enough money to purchase H1N1 vaccine. Some bloggers [RUS] found Peregorodiev's message similar to the one that escalated the swine flu panic in Ukraine a month ago. Like in the case with Saratov, the rumors in Ukraine also had “helicopters spraying disinfectant solution.” The Saratov Prosecutor's Office quickly announced [RUS] its plans to find disseminators of the rumors and Ivan Peregorodiev became the first to be arrested. He was accused of transmitting a “deliberately false information related to an act of terrorism” (Article 207 of the Russian Criminal Code). The Prosecutor's Office did not explain how the information in Peregorodiev's blog posts and the pneumonic plague rumors were related to any act of terrorism. The Institute for Collective Action, a Russian non-profit organization, started a campaign [RUS] to free Peregorodiev. Activists argue that, by questioning an official statement of Saratov officials, the blogger was exercising his right to the freedom of speech.

UPD: Ivan was released from jail on December 4th but is still under suspicion of committing a crime, reports Novaya Gazeta.

Russia: Tatarstan Blogger Sentenced to Almost 2 Years in Penal Colony

Alexey Sidorenko — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 12:05:55 +0000

On Nov. 26, the Kirov district court of Kazan, which is the capital of the Republic of Tartastan, convicted Irek Murtazin, a 45-year-old journalist and blogger, of defamation and incitement to hatred, reports Gazeta.ru [RUS]. The court sentenced Murtazin to one year and nine months of imprisonment in a penal colony (a form of imprisonment where convicts live not in a jail but in a special colony for prisoners).

About a year ago, in Dec. 2008, Murtazin – former head of Shaimiev's press service and currently an opposition blogger, aka lj-user irek-murtazin [RUS] – was accused of defamation against Mintimir Shaimiev, President of Tatarstan. On Sept. 12, 2008, Murtazin published a post in which he mentioned a piece of gossip about Shaimiev's death. He wrote [RUS]:

Пришла страшная весть…
…на 72-ом году жизни, во время отдыха в Турции (в Кемере) скоропостижно скончался Минтимер Шарипович Шаймиев.
Честно говоря – не верится. Точнее, не хочется верить. Потому что, если это правда, то начнется такая свара, такая нешуточная борьба за то, чтобы занять освободившееся кресло, что чубы у холопов будут трещать и вдоль и поперек. И именно из-за подобных перспектив, ближайшее окружение Минтимера Шариповича попытается скрыть эту информацию. Чтобы успеть перегруппироваться (вплоть до скоропостижной эвакуации из страны). Именно поэтому официальная информация, думаю, будет не раньше чем через неделю.

A horrible piece of news came in…
…Mintimir Sharipovich Shaimiev suddenly died on the 72nd year of life, while on vacation in Turkey (Kemer).
Frankly speaking – I can't believe it. To be precise – I don't want to believe it. Because, if it's true, then there will be such a mess, such a serious struggle to get into the vacant seat, that the peasants' forelocks will be cracking here and there. And it's because of these prospects that Shaimiev's closest circle will try to conceal this information. To win time to regroup (or even to leave the country). This is why, the official information, I think, will appear not earlier than in a week.

The rumor of Shaimiev's death was disproven on the same day, but the shares of the oil company allegedly owned by the representatives of the so-called “Shaimiev clan” dropped significantly, says Lenta.ru [RUS]. In Dec. 2008, Murtazin was officially accused of defamation and infringement upon personal inviolability of Shaimiev (It is important to note that the court acquitted Murtazin only on this latter charge).

The trial lasted almost a year, and prosecution kept adding new accusations, blaming Murtazin for defamation and libel not only on his blog, but also in Murtazin's book “Mintimir Shaimiev: The Last President of Tatarstan. Part 1″ as well as in his news bulletin “Our Kazan News” (”Наши казанские вести,” which Murtazin described [RUS] in Oct. 2008 as a “print digest” of his LiveJournal blog).

Murtazin said he didn't agree with the verdict and would file an appeal.

Photographs from the trial are available here.

***

Irek Murtazin's bio (according to Anticompromat.org)

Born in 1964 in Bogatye Saby settlement, Tatarstan
1981-1990 – served in the Soviet Army, also in GRU (military intelligence unit)
1985 – graduated from the Kazan Higher Tank College
1990-1991 – assistant to the legislator Vladimir Lopatin
1995 – graduated from the Moscow Government Law Academy
1991-1995 – editor-in-chief of newspapers “Russian North” and “Gubernskie Vesti”
1993-1995 – editor-in-chief of TV-7, a local TV channel in Vologda
1995-1999 – bureau chief of the VGTRK (the largest state-owned TV company) in Kazan
1999-2002 – head of the press service of the President of Tatarstan
2002-2003 – head of TV channel “Tatarstan”
2003-2004 – head of VGTRK's Minsk, Belarus, bureau
2006-2007 – member of the regional branch of A Just Russia party in Tatarstan
2008-2009 -publisher and editor-in-chief of the news bulletin “Our Kazan News” (printed outside Tatarstan in Cheboksary, Republic of Chuvashia)