Akong was sentenced to 20 years in jailed for an unproven lese majeste case on the basis of Thailand's Computer Crime Act. The 61-year-old grandfather, who had long battled with oral cancer, was believed to have died as a result of this disease. Attempts to get bail for Akong, most notably due to his illness, was repeatedly denied. Campaigns by activists and scholars in Thailand and abroad to free Ampon, while rallied substantial popular support, did not alter his situation. This case was hailed as one of “the most severe lese majeste convictions yet recorded.”

Amphon Tangnoppakul, right, pauses as he is arrested by Thai police - Image: AP Photo

During the trial, Ampon admitted not knowing how to send SMS messages and that he did not recognize the numbers belonging to the receivers. He wept throughout the entire ordeal and repeated his love for the king.

Judge Chanatip Mueanpawong clarified the verdict ” The prosecution could not produce a witness to definitively confirm that the defendant was the one sending the messages to the plaintiff's phone. It was difficult to present compelling evidence because the defendant, who committed such acts, would naturally conceal his actions so that others could not observe them. As such it is necessary to rely on circumstantial evidence to indicate the defendant's intentions.”
Akong was sentenced to 20 years in prison, 5 years for each SMS message sent.
The mobile phone messages were alleged by the authorities to have contained vulgar language defaming the queen and insulting the honor of the monarchy.

According to iLaw, the police relied on phone log by service provider and police witnesses to convict Akong.
The Office of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission agrees the case was circumstantial at best and warns mobile phone users to be especially mindful of their phone activity.

While in custody, the Court of Appeals repeatedly denied Ampon bail, citing the severity of the case as a threat to national security and possibility of his flight.

The death of “Uncle SMS” elicited strong, and polarized, reaction in the cyber community - many were outraged, while some cheerful.

“I wish this country would see justice and freedom, but I could only wish. I wish the ignorant would see the light, but I could only dream. I guess I would have to put up with this reality. After all death is inevitable” wrote Poltahan Manoke Klang Prapan.

Piangkam Pradabkwan composed a poem on her Facebook page, whose last verse was: “Akong is dead. Who killed the old man? Justice came too late - this is a crime. Human lives are cheap and abundant. They breathe and smell death every day.”

Others weren't so upset about the passing of Akong. “Please make merit for the old man. By now he's probably in hell with fire burning in his mouth,” major181226 responded to the Youtube clip about Akong. “He deserved to die. Our land would now be elevated. When the color ordeal is over, our country could progress. Or don't you agree?” posted Purno5.

The Akong case was about injustice and mistreatment of prisoners. We failed as a society to put our political differences aside when faced with such gross human rights violations. In this we should be ashamed.

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President Sata looking at the Facebook page of opposition MMD MP Dora Siliya. Picture courtesy of McLan Mkuni on the Bemba vs Nyanja: Miponto Sha Ci Mbuya group page.

A day after the glitch, Zambian Watchdog reported that its website was a target of a sustained attack allegedly by the PF government. Reported the website popularly known as ZWD among Zambian netizens:

PF government agents last Wednesday carried out their most ambitious attack on the Zambian Watchdog website with view of destroying it.

“The site has been attacked using denial of service and no personal information has been compromised”
The attackers have used Optima/Darkness DDoS botnet that is popular in the Russian-speaking cybercrime black market.
The Attack caused inaccessibility to the news for close to 8 hours.
Other websites like http://www.tumfweko.com were also brought down that day.

Although difficult to prove that the attack was carried out by the PF government, the relationship between the Zambian Watchdog and the PF has not been all rosy even as an opposition party before the 2011 elections. President Michael Sata’s statement when he swore in Attorney General Mumba Malila shortly after he took up the president did not help matters.

President Sata told Mr Malila who had once held the same position under the defeated MMD government:

“Last year when we were preparing for elections, these so called unregistered internet sites reported that Mr Sata had collapsed, Mr Sata is very sick, Mr Sata has died…

“So, I am not asking for a witch- hunt, but you as Attorney-General, let us enforce the laws of this country because all these internets are all orchestrated by the UPND. Last year the Watchdog website lied that he was dead, he was too sick, when in fact not. “

Chilling though, was a story that was reported earlier this year that the government had released K5 billion or US$1 million to send police and security staff around the world to train them to hack the targeted websites.

The Independent Post, which was also hit by a similar attack, quoting an email it got from Zambian Watchdog quoted from the Cyber War Zone website, reported:

Watchdog comment: The Watchdog is aware of the hackers sponsored by the PF government to wipe out all Independent news websites in Zambia.

About K5 billion tax payers money has been released to government agents and some have been sent to China and other countries to learn how to hack websites. Even though we hear that most of this money has been used on beer and prostitutes.

Graph of the distribution of DDoS attacks on Zambian Watchdog. Image source: zambianwatchdog.com.

A Wikipedia entry claiming that President Sata had been assassinated did not help matters in the relationship between citizen news websites and the government. It was shortly after that incident that the reported K5 billion was released for the war against recalcitrant news websites.

Commenting on the Zambian Watchdog attack story, Mufana Wamahafu wrote:

The PF will soon run out of cash in their quest to close critical online publications.Even if ZWD is brought down today, another one will immediately be setup by the same owners. The PF will have to subcontract the Vietnamese and Russians at what cost? Because we all know that PF has no capacity to even learn how to go about this whole process.Its a party of thick heards. I mean the president is a grade ZERO ZERO ZERO. Please hear this: ONLINE NEWS IS HERE TO STAY. FINITO!!! This is just a tip of the iceberg, ZWD and the rest of these online newspapers has’nt even reached their optimum. Its too early to press the panic button ba kaponya imwe [you louts].

Reacted a reader calling himself Say What?:

DoS attacks don’t come cheap and are difficult to sustain.
If the PF really is behind this then some great use of our tax money, huh? No price too high to pay for suppressing freedom of speech? Guess I missed that line in the PF Manifesto.

But one reader, Jackson, had a different view:

I DONT THINK A SERIOUS GOVT. CAN LOSE SLEEP OVER A SMALL,BIASED,TRIBAL AND UNETHICAL WEBSITE. THESE ALLEGATIONS ARE TOTALLY BASELESS.

On 2 April, 2012 Zambian Watchdog reported that the government has intensified crackdown on Internet users:

The PF government has heightened its internet crack down on citizens who use to discuss matters that affect them.

But the crackdown on the Internet may land the Zambian government in trouble as it risks being listed as one of the Internet enemies.

The government through its secret service is now monitoring and gathering Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of people who regularly comment on political matters on popular news websites or social media like Facebook and Twitter.

As example, the Zambia Media Forum, a private discussion group has been invaded by state agents who are passing on details of group members to the state.

Zambia Medium Forum is a discussion group whose members are mostly Zambian journalists and Civil Society activists. Some of the members work for government and parastatal companies./p>

Last week, at least three members of the Forum were interrogated by OP [Office of the Predisent] agents from their respective offices.

Originally posted on Global Voices.

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This year’s award will be focused on the extended community working with Global Voices. Many of our community members are also affiliated with other projects that have had significant impacts on freedom of expression in their communities and have a grassroots, civic character. We want to reward projects that have had a real impact, but are not incredibly well known, and for whom the support could make a significant difference in their development.

The Breaking Borders winners will be announced at the Global Voices Citizen Media Summit 2012, in Nairobi, Kenya on July 2-3, 2012.

Visit the Summit web site for background information on the goals of the meeting, the program of events, and registration details.

The Breaking Borders Award is open to the extended Global Voices community. Winners will be selected by a panel of experts in the field of freedom of expression. Two cash prizes of $10,000 will be awarded for an individual or group that has:

• used online tools to promote free expression or encourage social or political change
• created an important tool that enables free expression and expands access to information
• been instrumental in forming a community that has advanced free expression and access to information

Who can enter: Any member of the Global Voices community, including Global Voices in English, Lingua and Global Voices Advocacy, who has written, edited or translated at least one post in the history of Global Voices, and all Rising Voices grantees.

Nominations are for ongoing projects that have already demonstrated significant effects in their field of endeavor, based on work achieved in the last two years. We will consider projects that are created by or strongly affiliated with any member of the Global Voices community. If you are a GV volunteer, staff, or board member, and also a creator or hold a leadership role in another project, that project is eligible. You can nominate your own project.

Submit your nomination for the Breaking Borders Award using this online form. Applications close on May 20, 2012.

Contact us at “eddie at globalvoicesonline.org” with any questions.

FAQS

What is the Breaking Borders Award?

The Breaking Borders award was set up by Global Voices and Google to highlight the importance of free expression around the world by honoring an outstanding web projects by individuals or groups, who have shown courage, energy and resourcefulness in using the internet or mobile phones to promote freedom of expression, ensure that diverse political viewpoints are heard and stand up to those who censor information.

Who can participate?

Anyone who is a member of the Global Voices extended community, with a relevant online or mobile presence can participate. Nominate yourself, a blog, website or other online presence you consider has helped promote the free circulation of ideas, stood up against censorship, helped local communities, raised awareness about a specific issue or cause, mobilised government or supported silenced voices.

Are there any geographical restrictions to participate?

No, the nominee can be based or support a cause anywhere in the world.

How do I nominate?

Fill out the nomination form. Please understand that we can accept nominations only if you provide the following information: a) the name and contact information for the nominee (or the organisation/initiative) b) blog, website or other mobile or online presence that showcases the value of the nominee, c) why the nominee merits the Breaking Borders Award, d) if self nominating, how you would use the prize money, and e) your contact details, so we can get in touch with you if we have further questions.

How will the winners be elected?

Members of the Global Voices board will select the final winners.

Will there only be one winner?

There will be two winners.

Will the winner receive a prize?

The awardees will receive a prize of $10,000 each.

What is the deadline for nominations?

The deadline for nominations is the 20th of May, 2012.

When will the winner be announced?

The awards will be announced in July 2012.

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On March and April, when the state of emergency was announced in Bahrain, and the Shield of Jazeera (a combination of troops from Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates) came to aid the Bahraini forces in attacking peaceful protestors, there has also been a cyber war. Pro-Bahraini government Facebook users (or thugs!) started uploading the photos of activists with red circles around their faces. Instead of questioning the ones who threaten civilians, the government of Bahrain started arresting activists whose photos appear on Facebook. One of them was Ayat Al-Qarmizi, Bahraini poetess, who was later released after months of brutal torture and ill treatment in prison. Some activists disappeared like Global Voices’ blogger Ali Abdulemam, while others were killed like the citizen journalist Ahmed Ismael.

That’s not history yet. Last week, the Bahraini authorities arrested the President of the Human Rights Centre in Bahrain, Nabeel Rajab when he returned from Lebanon at Bahrain’s International Airport. Apparently, the Bahraini government claim that Rajab was arrested because of his “insulting tweets.” I invite all to visit his Twitter page @NABEELRAJAB, and search for “insulting” material. For an oppressive state like Bahrain, using Twitter and other social media to expose human rights violations is “insulting the constitution.”

Sadly hilarious, Manama was announced as “the Capital of Arab Culture,” while it’s the place where the state kills, arrests and kidnaps online activists.  I hope that my blog post will not be considered as “insulting” by the Bahraini monarchy neither my Tweets on @YusurAlBahrani.

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Freedom Fast hunger strike, India. Image courtesy ‘I Love India'.

Most of this report was researched, written, and edited by Weiping Li, Mera Szendro Bok, James Losey, and Sarah Myers.

Internet activists in India are fuming over the country’s sweeping new Internet restrictions on objectionable content, and are beginning to take extreme action to combat the law. This week we recognize Aseem Trivedi and Alok Dixit from Save Your Voice, who have begun a hunger strike in protest of the ‘Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules 2011’ which were quietly issued by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in April 2011.

One of the flaws of the new rules is that they mandate that website or domain owners must take down material within 36 hours when a third party issues a complaint, without giving a chance for content owners to defend the material. The Bangalore-based advocacy group Centre for Internet & Society also pointed out that the rule leads to a general chilling effect on freedom of expression over the Internet.

Member of Parliament Shri P. Rajeev has moved to have the rules annulled amid widespread protests by India’s netizen community. As a growing number of MP's become aware of the issue some see some hope that the censorship law will be discarded. For more details, analysis and links see this post on Global Voices.

Censorship

As the case of the blind activist lawyer Chen Guangcheng remained unresolved, censorship  continued to be a pressing issue in China: in the past week, the Web buzzed with the keywords “Chen Guangcheng,” “blind lawyer,” and “U.S. [United States] Embassy,” all of which were censored from the Chinese Internet. But Chinese netizens found ways to circumvent the censorship by replacing the sensitive words with synonyms or homonyms.

In this dramatic episode, Twitter also played an important role: New America Foundation Senior Fellow Emily Parker, writing in the New Republic, pointed out that the activists used Twitter to reveal that Chen’s departure from the Embassy was not as voluntary as the Chinese government indicated.

In the Middle East, more countries are preparing to crack down on social media: Israel’s army has upgraded its system to monitor communications over social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter, and Kuwait’s information minister announced that the country is going to regulate social media websites in order to “safeguard the cohesiveness of the population and society.”

May 3 meanwhile marked the World Press Freedom Day. Several articles invited readers to contemplate the role of the Internet and mobile technology in press freedom: Danny O'Brien of Committee to Protect Journalists explored Internet controls in the world's most censored countries, whilst Nieman Labs discussed how mobile technology has fundamentally redefined the role of journalists - with implications for the defense of their freedom to publish.

Surveillance

According to a report from CNET, Microsoft's support for the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), which was passed late last month by the U.S. House of Representatives, appears to be weakening. The Act is strongly opposed by civil liberties groups concerned that it it expands the U.S. government's surveillance powers to unacceptable levels. Time Magazine’s Techland breaks down the facts on who supports CISPA and who doesn’t.

The FBI has drafted a law to require web-based services to install “wiretap-friendly” back doors which facilitate government surveillance. This proposal would expand the application of the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act to more tech companies, which have been struggling to keep the promise of protecting customers’ privacy.

Sovereigns of cyberspace

Facebook has become the first company to obtain observer status with the Global Network Initiative, a multi-stakeholder organization which brings together tech companies, human rights activists, and socially responsible investors to increase corporate accountability in upholding core principles of free expression and privacy.

Google is negotiating with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over its violation of privacy by bypassing the privacy protection setting in Apple's Safari browser. The fine levied by the FTC could be more than US$ 10 million.

In more Google-related news, the company's recent report to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) reveals that the company has been collecting data from unsecured Wi-Fi locations using software developed for Street View.

Internet rights and governance

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which coordinates the global domain name system, has announced that public board meetings will be replaced with a closed door board session. Philip C. Corwin of the Internet Commerce Association has criticized the change and argues the board meetings should be webcast live.

More than 2,000 applications have been submitted to ICANN by organizations around the world wanting to create new “generic top-level domains” (the part of the domain name that comes after the “.”)  The application process has been delayed due to a technical glitch, which may have given some applicants an unfair advantage.

The Internet World Stats website released its Q1 2012 statistics, showing that the top five countries with the most Internet users are now China, United States, India, Japan, and Brazil.

The FBI has returned a seized server related to the series of anonymous bomb threats issued against the University of Pittsburgh, to Riseup Networks and May First/People Link. The FBI seizure has been widely criticized by Internet freedom advocates for being overreaching and unnecessary.

Netizen activism

As Malaysian protesters hit the streets for Malaysia’s Bersih 3.0 rally to protest government corruption, smartphones played a crucial role in capturing state violence.

The Reddit community raised US$ 7,500 for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) to support Internet freedom initiatives.

The German Pirate Party, which advocates copyright reform and opposes Internet censorship and surveillance, has scored four key electoral victories in the Saarland regional Parliament.

Esra’a Al Shafei, Bahraini activist and founder of Mideast Youth, spoke in a recent interview about her organization CrowdVoice.org, a user-powered service that tracks voices of protest from around the world by crowdsourcing information.

National policy

The British government is considering a new measure to protect children from adult content. The government’s plan is to block all adult material by default, while adults have to opt in when signing contracts with Internet Service Providers if they want to view porn websites.

In Singapore, the government has reached out to the netizen community, asking them to come up with an “Internet Code of Conduct” to tackle issues of anonymity, false rumors and extremism online.  The call has been met with opposition from the Internet community.

The Obama Administration is urging Congress to renew provisions of a law called the “Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act” set to expire at the end of this year. The American Civil Liberties Union is calling on Congress to amend FISA which currently enables “dragnet” surveillance and warrantless wiretapping by the National Security Agency. In order to be compatible with Internet freedom, FISA must be revised to mandate greater transparency about the government’s surveillance activities, and strengthening safeguards for privacy.

Copyright

To commemorate the International Day Against DRM (Digital Rights Management) on May 4, Creative Commons listed the reasons why DRM should be boycotted, and the website Defective by Design.org also persuaded Internet users to take action.

The jury in the Oracle-Google copyright dispute has reached a partial verdict on which the jury found that Google’s use of Oracle’s application programming interfaces has infringed on Oracle’s copyright. In a related ruling, the European Court of Justice ruled that APIs and functionality of a computer program are not protected by copyright.

Cybersecurity

A SophosLabs researcher found that a Firefox add-on ShowIP, which shows IP address and related information of a website, also reports online activities of the users to a third-party server without users’ acknowledgement.

Cool things

• The Data Journalism Handbook is a free, open-source book and collaborative effort from leading journalism practitioners and advocates that aims to help journalists to use data to improve the news.
• The Mobile Africa report identifies best practices and emerging directions for mobile innovation in Africa, and highlights the increasing profile of award winners from Africa in mobile excellence competitions in the region and globally.
• Meta Activism, a crowdsourced database of nonviolent methods upgraded to incorporate the latest technology, has launched a new tool to map the best digital resources for advocates.
• The State Department has issued a request for proposals of projects that support Internet freedom.

Publications and studies

• The Right to Communicate policy brief, Article 19
• Empowering Independent Media: U.S. Efforts to Foster a Free Press and an Open Internet Around the World, CIMA
• Toward a Single Global Digital Economy: The First Report of the Aspen Institute IDEA Project

For upcoming events related to the future of citizen rights in the digital age, see the Global Voices Events Calendar.

Subscribe to the Netizen Report by email

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The Netherlands is also implementing privacy protections for users against wiretapping and disconnection by the Internet Service Providers (ISPs), which will no longer be able to interrupt  traffic of users unless it is proven to be in the public interest.

The legislation is a landmark and an example for other countries in Europe and around the world. According to Bits of Freedom, the activist group who advocated for the law's passage, the new provisions are especially important for the privacy of netizens:

In addition, the law includes an anti-wiretapping provision, restricting internet providers from using invasive wiretapping technologies, such as deep packet inspection (DPI). They may only do so under limited circumstances, or with explicit consent of the user, which the user may withdraw at any time. The use of DPI gained much attention when KPN admitted that it analysed the traffic of its users to gather information on the use of certain apps. The law allows for wiretapping with a warrant.

Moreover, the law includes a provision ensuring that internet providers can only disconnect their users in a very limited set of circumstances. Internet access is very important for functioning in an information society, and providers currently could on the basis of their terms and conditions disconnect their users for numerous reasons. The provision allows for the disconnection in the case of fraud or when a user doesn’t pay his bills.

Applause for The Netherlands!

Under an Attribution Creative Commons License 3.0 by erikwestrum

* While it is still a work in process, a general translation of the new law has been published by the active NGO Bits of Freedom.

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On April 16-20, 2012 the 21st International World Wide Web Conference (#WWW2012) gathered around 2,500 internet and social science professionals, web and mobile technology creators, researchers and scholars, in Lyon, France to discuss matters of global concern for the Internet and the Web. The main themes were “Society and Knowledge” and “The Future Direction of the Web”.

The conference agenda covered both social and technological issues, as well as Internet and democracy, free access to services, freedom of expression, regulation and censorship, control and copyright. The #WWW2012 proceedings are available online, so the many interesting papers can be downloaded. Plenary keynotes videos are also available.

I was a program committee member for a Making Sense of Microposts (#MSM12) workshop. I also presented a research paper on “phatic communication” and why tweets and Facebook updates on weather, food, and mundane life are useful for online communities, human relationships and social networks (I have written about this subject here, here, and here).

“Imagine what you want the world to look like”

But perhaps the major highlight of #WWW2012 was an inspiring keynote on April 18 by Tim Berners-Lee (TBL), the inventor of the World Wide Web and Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). He shared insights on the current situation of the web, as well as future directions that could threaten the vitality of the Internet. Rallying the crowd, he said, “Democracy depends on an open internet. Go out in the streets and complain that your democracy is being threatened. (It’s) a duty, something you have to do.”

Tim Berners-Lee gives keynote speech at WWW2012: Photo by Danica Radovanovic

TBL touched on the most pressing issues of open data, open government, privacy and control, Net Neutrality, and future generations. As daily blog Demain le Mail (in French) reported:

Le fondateur du web a réalisé un plaidoyer en faveur d’un Internet libre et ouvert. Lors de sa keynote, il a exprimé ses inquiétudes concernant la collecte et l’exploitation des données personnelles. Pour Tim Berners-Lee, la menace vient de principalement de l’industrie et les utilisateurs du web doivent agir et ne pas hésiter à réclamer leurs données personnelles à Facebook ou Google par exemple ».

TBL insists, as Australian Dejanseo reports, on democratic platforms online, decentralized and open data, as well as the importance of:

the principle of least effort when designing new languages, encouraging the usage of open mobile applications if they don’t like the world of closed systems. He also stressed as in the panel the importance of the openness – open data, suggesting that the UK government needs to understand what open standards are, and urged the same for governments in any country to embrace the movement of open data. Data should be open for public: government statistics, economic, social, demographic, non-sensitive related to democracy and political debate.

Speaking about the openness and the applications accessible to all, TBL  points the finger at Apple, without naming it. E. Delsol writes about it:

Face aux apps d'Apple, de Google et des autres, le W3C milite pour le développement des web apps - open mobile web apps -, ces applications créées avec html5 et accessibles depuis n'importe quel navigateur, sur n'importe quel système. Tout internaute peut accéder à l'ensemble des applications disponibles en ligne. Il enjoint les développeurs dans la salle : “La solution est entre vos mains : développez des web apps, pas des apps !”

A comment [fr] by “Open Africa” on an 01.Net article agrees with TBL's statements and reflects on the efforts for remaining the openness in Africa as well:

Je souhaite souvent que le web reste ouvert à la créativité des utilisateurs de tout lieu y compris ceux d'Afrique.Je tiens à féliciter TBL pour ces mises au point claires et virulentes.Nous travaillons beaucoup aussi ici en Afrique de l'Ouest pour avoir une meilleure visibilté sur le net tout en espérant profiter pleinement du réseau pour créer,partager, briller et donner le meilleur de nos talents.

TBL also voiced his opposition to the treaties that advocate increased surveillance and regulation of the Internet, including ACTA.

Some think, including Des Illusion blog, that TBL binds the future of the web and democracy to tightly:

Si nos libertés sur le Web sont certes menacées ou malmenées par des politiques gouvernementales répressives (SOPA, PIPA, Hadopi) pressées par des lobbies industriels et économiques ; il ne faut pas oublier que le Web n’est qu’un des supports de communication existant dans l’espace public démocratique, et non l’unique. Le web est une technologie et non un droit, ni une liberté, même si il devient le moyen d’échange prépondérant d’idées entre individus par une infinité d’outils : blogs, mails, chat, réseaux sociaux… Dans les pays arabo-musulmans, le web a joué le rôle d’un facilitateur par ses outils, permettant une mobilisation rapide et massive des protestataires au Caire, à Tunis ou à Tripoli ; mais il n’a jamais fait la révolution. Une révolution ne se fait pas avec des machines, mais avec les hommes qui sont derrière.

As someone strictly opposed to bills that advocate increased surveillance of the Internet, threaten basic freedoms on privacy, expression and the access to information, TBL asked the audience to:

…spend 90% of our time doing cool stuff, invent new things […], but the remaining 10% go to protect the open Web infrastructure on which all this is built. Because otherwise we cannot innovate, because the platforms will be closed, because service providers will control traffic.

Obviously we all need to reflect individually on these present critical issues in our society and embrace collectively actions that will foster the growth, stability, and healthy, open and neutral eco system of the Internet. Since democracy depends on the open internet - so the human discourse depends on the open internet as well, with the massive engagement where everyone gets involved.

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Photo from digital-democracy.org

Most of this report was researched, written, and edited by Weiping Li, Mera Szendro Bok, James Losey, and Sarah Myers.

This week, the Netizen Report launches its first weekly edition. With this change, we hope to make our news round-up more timely and actionable, as a first stop for news from around the world  for Internet activists.

Our inaugural weekly edition honors Ms. Chiranuch Premchaiporn, better known to her friends and supporters by her nickname “Jiew,” who told Digital Democracy in the interview captured above: “I just follow the things that I believe.”

Director of the popular online Thai newspaper Prachatai, Ms. Premchaiporn was arrested in 2009, accused of not acting quickly enough to remove reader comments that were deemed insulting to the King of Thailand. On Monday, the Thai Criminal Court delayed the delivery of a verdict in its lese majeste trial against Ms. Premchaiporn.

The case has fueled criticism from international human rights and press freedom groups of Thailand's computer crime laws, which hold website operators and other Internet “intermediaries” liable for the actions of their users. The Southeast Asian Press Alliance points out that the postponement of a court verdict is “highly unusual” and reflects the importance of the case - which will have major “implications to freedom of expression, especially in the light of the trend towards online journalism, even in the region.”

Meanwhile, netizens around the world are taking inspiration from people like Jiew, as the struggle for online freedom and rights continues.

Censorship

China’s crackdown on Internet use has escalated this week, with Weibo (a microblog platform) accounts now being deleted to prevent to spread of dissent. Google’s launch this week of its new cloud storage service, Google Drive, has already been blocked in China as well.

An article by Radio France Internationale (in Chinese) describes a 2009 document revealed by Chinese netizens in which the Supreme People’s Court of China ordered lower courts not to hear cases involving Internet censorship, which may explain why lawsuits filed by netizens have been rejected by the courts.

Netizens are beginning to protest India’s IT Act passed quietly in April 2011, restricting web content designated as “disparaging,” “harassing,” “blasphemous,” or “hateful.” An article overviewing Internet regulations in India notes that there are more ways to ban content online in the country than there are to ban physical books and other kinds of media.

The Tor Project has a new tool called the Open Observatory for Network Interference (OONI) to help detect and map global Internet censorship.

In Palestine, the communications minister of the Palestinian Authority resigned this week, over claims senior officials had ordered websites critical of government leaders to be blocked.

Surveillance

Despite hopes by civil liberties groups that the United States House of Representatives would amend the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) to increase privacy protection, additional provisions for the unfettered sharing of information between government and private sector Internet companies were instead added last week, and the bill was passed by the House.

CISPA now moves to the Senate and faces a veto threat from President Obama in its current form. Internet Law Professor Susan Crawford writes in a Bloomberg article that CISPA is part of an escalating cyber arms race with negative implications for Internet freedom around the world. One danger of CISPA - in addition to legalizing unfettered surveillance in the United States - is overbroad definitions of “cyber threats” that could allow anti-censorship tools to be labeled as cyber-terror.

Swedish television has posted an online version with English subtitles of its recent exposé showing how “Nordic Telecom giant Teliasonera is intimately connected to human rights abuses in the former CIS countries where the company is a dominant player in the mobile telephony market.” In the same week the Swedish newspaper DN.se published an investigative report about Ericsson's involvement with surveillance in Belarus.

Privacy

Austria has delayed implementation of the European Union Data Retention directive. Thousands of Austrians have voiced their support of Austria not implementing the directive and citizens have until May 18, to add their voice.

A new law in Mexico gives authorities greater power to access real-time geolocation data from mobile phone companies.

Thuggery

This week Décio Sá, a Brazilian journalist and blogger, was assasinated while in a São Luis bar, clearly for political reasons according to the police.

Netizen activism

The Engine Room, a new organization that seeks to improve coordination between advocates, technologists, and support organizations, have outlined in a Global Voices Advocacy post four principles for how technology can be used for advocacy, including the importance of localizing training to meet local advocacy needs.

Internet governance

Andrea Renda, a senior research fellow at the Centre for European Policy Studies, authored a Wall Street Journal op-ed arguing against an increased role for the UN in overseeing Internet governance, and in favor of private governance.

In the United States, the District Court of Eastern Virginia ruled that Facebook ‘likes’ are not protected as free speech.

Copyright

Hong Kong artists are opposing an attempt to create a more restrictive copyright regime, a law that would not allow a fair use exemption for derivative works.

ACTA also continues to encounter resistance in the European Union, as the European Data Protection Official cautioned that the trade agreement could result in widespread monitoring and conflict with the right to privacy.

BitTorrent release group IMAGiNE members have been indicted and may face years in prison following a Immigration and Customs Enforcement investigation.

The New York Times profiled “one of the world’s most prolific bootleggers,” a 92 year old World World II veteran who copies Hollywood films to send to troops.

Tor Books, a major science fiction publisher, has announced that they will offer e-books without digital rights management restrictions.

Drafted guidelines were released this week by the Supreme People’s Court of China that seek to give a judicial interpretation of Internet copyright infringement. The proposed rules urge Internet companies to voluntarily censor their material, and unearth Internet copyright infringement by their users.

Cool things

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has launched a coder rights mailing list.

Publications and studies

• The Committee to Protect Journalists has launched the Journalist Security Guide
• Deep packet inspection and bandwidth management: Battles over BitTorrent in Canada and the United States (Paywall)

Written by Rebecca MacKinnon · comments (1)
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Today, having CCTV surveillance cameras at every street corner is the norm: even better, it is for our safety. It may even be in vogue, as illustrated by this video from the lowcost fashion brand Pimkie that invites you to discover what colors women in the streets of Europe are wearing and gives you ideas for the most stylish outfits.

For your safety. Surveillance camera sign in Berlin, Germany. Image by Cory Doctorow on flickr (CC-BY-SA 2.0)

Happily, sprawling privacy invasions have also been denounced for many years. One of the fighters is the London-based organisation Privacy International. Among other initiatives, they launched the Big Brother Awards in 1998 to requite “government agencies, private companies and individuals who have excelled in the violation of our privacy.” Privacy infringers of all kinds are selected, evidence is collected, and a dedicated jury as well as any citizen can vote for the winners, though “losers” might be a better term since the honour of winning such an award is doubtful. Positive actions are also rewarded with prizes that aim to foster critical questioning of various surveillance initiatives.

The Big Brother Awards have gained in popularity over the last 10 years and citizens of many countries have joined. Today, more than 75 award ceremonies have been held since 1998 in many European countries, as well as Australia, Japan, and more. Here is a brief round-up:

Germany

Germany held their most recent ceremony [en] in April 2012. The winner in the “Government and Administration” category was the Minister of the Interior of Saxony for having collected the mobile phone data of more than 1 million people last year after an anti-neonazi demonstration, an action he described [de] as “lawful” for investigative purposes. An award also went to “The Cloud” as a means to highlight the danger of online distributed services: users are more and more keen to relinquish their data to remote servers which are prone to be accessed by foreign governments (the US can collect data through the Patriot Act even though the cloud provider is located in Europe).

The German Cyber-Defence Center and its most fervent proponent, the Minister of the Interior Hans-Peter Friedrich, were rewarded for blurring the lines between police, military and intelligence. Last but not least: the software company Gamma Group was rewarded for its long-standing practice of developing and selling surveillance software to Egypt and other repressive governments.

Belgium

Belgium held it second ceremony in January. The winners highlighted the compromised security of personal data collected by various public and private institutions, including public transportation administrations, and electricity suppliers. The Westkust city police was the big winner, for their VIP (”Very Irritating Police” — this is its real name) project: it perverts the law by establishing a “guilty until proven innocent” rule and is intrusive to personal freedom. Meanwhile, the positive Winston Award (a direct reference to the main character of “1984″, Winston Smith) went to the online game Yoogle!. The game simulates a mini-Web2.0 cyberspace that represents how personal data is managed and exchanged between social media companies and users.

Austria

Big Brother Awards Austria [de] held their 13th ceremony in October 2011. Among those rewarded was lifelong privacy invader and tabloid press editor, Wolfgang Fellner [de] who received the elegant “grandpa of incestuous journalism” prize, alongside award winners from the Ministry of the Interior and the Austrian Anti-Terror Police. The Austrian committee granted Max Schrems with the distinction of “Defensor Libertatis” for his “Europe vs. Facebook” campaign.

Bulgaria

Bulgaria [bg] held the 5th edition [bg] of the Big Brother Awards in 2011. Winning this year were Ministry of Interior and mobile phone providers, for notorious insufficient legal and corporate privacy and personal security protections.

Image by Rob Pongsajapan on Flickr (CC-BY 2.0)

France

France [fr] has perhaps the finest-featured selection of nominees and winners. It is unclear whether this is solely due to an ever-worsening situation or that the organizers simply have well-defined categories. Whatever the reason, the 10th edition of the French Awards requited 10 out of more than 40 nominees. The huge list of infringements cautiously excluded [fr] President Sarkozy's “doping and chronic recidivism”, and focused on personal freedoms and privacy in public schools, and increased criminalization of migrants and their supporters. Attention was also drawn to various local initiatives aimed at establishing permanent and pervasive video-surveillance, referred to as “video-protection”, a newspeak shift that was already rewarded in 2009 [fr].

The positive “Prix Voltaire” award went to the citizen rights group Pièces et Main d'oeuvre for their longtime activity informing and raising awareness about the totalitarian dangers of techno-science such as nano-technology.

Written by Malicia Rogue · comments (2)
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Free speech activists have been calling for a fair dealing exemption of “derivate work” in the bill but the government has refused the amendment. A group of local artists is now launching a signature campaign to stop the bill. Below is their statement (via inmediahk.net)

Say No to Stupid Copyright Protection
Say Yes to Freedom of Creation
Local Art and Cultural Communities stand against “Copyright (Amendment) Bill”

The government claims that by “strengthening our copyright regime in the digital environment helps the environment for creativity to flourish, and would generally bring a positive impact on the economy” and is therefore proposing the “Copyright (Amendment) Bill” (see Copyright Ordinance (Chapter 528)). The government is now urging the Legislative Council to pass its “Second Public Consultation on the draft Code of Practice for Online Service Providers” on 9 May 2012. According to the draft, criminal sanctions will be introduced against so-called “unauthorised communication of copyright works”. In other words, any form of creation (namely literature. drama, music, architecture, sculpture, photography, film, broadcasting, graphic design, computer programming, sound recording and artwork creation) regarded as affecting “prejudicially the copyright owners” could be illegal and charged straight by the government. Once the draft is passed, not only netizens, but all art and cultural practitioners at large will be affected, the right to create will be deeply threatened. As part of the art and cultural circle, we denounce such draft which ignored the true meaning of right and the medium of creation today, and appeals only to the interest of copyright owners by risking destroying the creativity of art and cultural communities. We find it particularly disgusting that the government pays no attention to these contemporary situations and the voices against this bill, but intends it is rushing to pass the unjust bill now, and will only consider adjusting its details later. The legislative procedure is groundless, yet its impact will be devastating. We therefore demand:

1. Re-evaluating the Right of Creation

The production in the digital milieu has taken a very different form as we have seen in the past decade. The new forms of writings, editing, creations are intrinsic to the nature of the Internet and digital technologies, for example reproductivity, remixing, mash up, etc. The new forms of creation reconstitute the public space, and also become the proper means to access to the ‘res public’. The right to creation in this new epoch must be evaluated and be granted without regressing back to law that is against its own spirit.

2. NO Criminal Sanctions

With such a regression, the government could charge any creation with or without the knowledge of its copyright owner (if any), but who really is the creator and is there any idea which comes no where. At such, any text or image creation could be potentially charged as criminal act. The government becomes the only player that values the ‘violation’, and such law will obviously be an easy excuse for political prosecution.

3. Recognize Net Culture; Respect Intellectual Sharing

It is unjust for the government to control EVERY mode of electronic transmission including Point-to-Point and social media information sharing platform in the name of ‘protecting intellectual properties’. Derivation, transformation, rearrangement and uploading on the internet is a crucial part of network sharing culture, if not already an essential part of everyday life. The government should not sheltering the interest of mere big enterprises and business, and remain blind to the alternative ‘copyright’ movements such as the Creative Commons, General Public License, etc.

4. Reforming a fairer Copyright Bill
Creation is about freedom of expression, sharing of knowledge, values, etc. However, the current draft emphasizes only the interest of copyright owners without really paying attention to creativity and the process of creations. The draft should not be drafted only by the Commerce, Industry and Tourism Branch of the Commerce and Economic Development Bureau, instead all parties concerned including artists, creators, art-educators, scholars and cultural practitioners should be involved in rewriting the Copyright Bill.

The voice of Anti-Bill is loud enough that the Government should NOW call off the bill amendment.
Ban the “Copyright (Amendment) Bill 2011” now!
Art and cultural practitioners now stand together against such threat on creation.

Written by Oiwan Lam · comments (2)
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