Free expression in the news - Index on Censorship

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Free expression in the news

#DONTSPYONME Tell Europe’s leaders to stop mass surveillance #dontspyonme Index on Censorship launches a petition calling on European Union Heads of Government to stop the US, UK and other governments from carrying out mass surveillance. We want to use public pressure to ensure Europe’s leaders put on the record their opposition to mass surveillance. They […]

By Index on Censorship

13 Aug 13

In the News

#DONTSPYONME
Tell Europe’s leaders to stop mass surveillance #dontspyonme
Index on Censorship launches a petition calling on European Union Heads of Government to stop the US, UK and other governments from carrying out mass surveillance. We want to use public pressure to ensure Europe’s leaders put on the record their opposition to mass surveillance. They must place this issue firmly on the agenda for the next European Council Summit in October so action can be taken to stop this attack on the basic human right of free speech and privacy.
(Index on Censorship)

CANADA
Censorship Can’t be Our Default Internet Setting
Who should decide what websites you can access online? The answer is obvious: You.
(Huffington Post)

CHINA
What a murder mystery reveals about Chinese censorship
At first glance, the only thing out of place in the photograph of a dim, dingy bedroom in Kabul, Afghanistan, released last week by Xinhua, China’s state-controlled news agency, is the giant fluorescent bulb hanging inexplicably below a gilded, five-branch chandelier. It is not: the room is a crime scene, the place where, this past Thursday, an attack left three Chinese nationals dead and two more people missing.
(The New Yorker)

How Censorship Hurts Chinese Internet Companies
Beijing’s block of Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter has allowed domestic equivalents to grow. But by shunning global markets, their long-term outlook is uncertain.
(The Atlantic)

INDIA
Indian court orders Facebook, Google to offer plans for protecting children
The New Delhi High Court has given Facebook and Google one month to submit suggestions on how minors can be protected online in India.
(Index on Censorship)

Freedom of Expression: Indians are Becoming Increasingly Intolerant
Instead of nurturing the spirit of debate, we have become aggressive, bigoted and abusive
(Forbes India)

TAIWAN
Censorship quietly flourishes amid outrage
Taiwan’s once-famously freewheeling press is becoming more reliant on China as cross-strait cultural and media exchanges grow
(Index on Censorship)

UKRAINE
TVA channel still off the air, censorship suspected
Nearly three weeks after local TVA channel was forced to suspend its broadcast, a group of 28 deputies from local councils of Chernivtsi Oblast asked the National Council on Television and Radio Broadcasting to intervene.
(Kyiv Post)

UNITED KINGDOM
Artificially inadequate: we should never let machines rule on censorship
One of the great irritations about freedom of speech is that the people who demand it most are the ones who deserve it least. The very worst, I reckon, are the oxygen thieves who demand complete freedom for themselves but try to silence others.
(TechRadar)

UNITED STATES
The Business of Financing Hate Groups: Legal to Censor, but Unwise
It’s so tempting to go for the easy answer. Credit card companies are private businesses. They generally have the right, including possibly the First Amendment right, to refuse to deal with anyone. (Exceptions might include a collusive financial blockade of any group, which could violate antitrust law, and of course there are anti-discrimination laws.) That should apply all the more to bigots, right?
(ACLU)

Strip Club Owner Brings Epic Free Speech Fight To The US Supreme Court
The owner of an Albany, N.Y. strip club called Nite Moves has hired one of America’s best free speech lawyers to help him convince the Supreme Court that taxes on lap dances should be illegal, The Daily Gazette reports.
(Business Insider)