20 Jun 14 | Digital Freedom, News and features, Russia
@AndreiSoldatov and @cyberrights at the @IndexCensorship Brussels event on Press Freedom in Russia Turkey Azerbaijan. Photo: Ricardo Gutiérrez
On Thursday, Index hosted a discussion with five leading media experts from Turkey, Russia, and Azerbaijan. As journalists, bloggers, entrepreneurs and campaigners, they experience first-hand how censorship – online and off – is being ramped up in their countries, and they argue that their stories are still not being sufficiently heard.
Turkey’s Yaman Akdeniz and Amberin Zaman, Russia’s Andrei Soldatov and Anton Nossik, and Azeri blogger Arzu Geybulla shared shocking stories about journalists harassed in government-led smear campaigns, the arrests on spurious criminal charges of those who speak openly on social media, and the growing role of governments in blocking free expression online.
“The internet is becoming less and less independent of government interference,” Nossik told the Brussels audience.
Index works with writers – including authors, journalists and bloggers – and artists globally to help them tell a wider world about the threats they face. We are a platform that allows individuals to speak for themselves, and fights for those who cannot.
In the first article from one of our event speakers, Andrei Soldatov assesses the state of online freedom in Russia:
Since November 2012, we’ve been living in a country with the internet censored extensively by a nationwide system of filtering.
This system has been constantly updated ever since. Now we have four official blacklists of banned websites and pages: the first one is to deal with sites deemed extremist; the second is about sites blocked because of child pornography, suicide and drugs; the third consists of sites with copyright problems; the fourth, the most recent one, was created in February and lists the sites blocked without a court order because they call for non-sanctioned protests. There is also an unofficial fifth blacklist aimed not at sites but at hosting companies, based abroad, which have proven themselves not very cooperative with Russian authorities.
Technically, the internet filtering system in Russia is not very sophisticated. Thousands of sites were blocked by mistake, while if you want to access a blocked site you can do that using circumvention tools or even very basic things like Google translate.
At the same time very few people were sent to jail for posting critical things online, and relatively few new media were put under direct government pressure.
But surprisingly, freedom of expression on the internet in Russia has been hugely affected: users have become cautious in their comments, and internet companies, the largest in the country, even when invited to talk to Putin, are so frightened that they failed to raise the issue of regulation at the meeting.
The beauty of the Russian approach is that it doesn’t need to be technically sophisticated to be efficient. It also doesn’t need mass repression against journalists or activists.
So why is that?
Basically, the Russian approach is all about instigating self-censorship. To do this, you need to draft the legislation as broad as possible, to have the restrictions constantly expanded — like the recent law which requires bloggers with more than 3.000 followers to be registered — and companies, internet service providers, NGOs and media will rush to you to be consulted and told what’s allowed. You should also show that you don’t hesitate to block entire services like YouTube – and companies will come to you suggesting technical solutions, as happened with DPI (deep packet inspection). It helps the government to shift the task of developing a technical solution to business, as well as costs.
You also need to encourage pro-government activists to attack the most vocal critics, to launch websites with list of so-called national traitors, and then to have Vladimir Putin himself to use this very term in a speech.
All that sends a very strong message. And as a result, journalists will be fired for critical reporting from Ukraine by media owners, not by the government; the largest internet companies will seek private meetings with Putin, and users of social networks will become more cautious in their comments.
We have seen this before – the very same approach was used against traditional media in the 2000s. What made the situation on the internet special is that the government found a way to shift the task of providing a technical solution for censorship to companies, including the global ones, and make the companies pay for the system. The way global platforms seem to respond to that is not very impressive. Localisation cannot be a solution because it helps to localise the problems of censorship. Now the Russian search engine Yandex presents two different maps of Ukraine, with and without Crimea, for the Ukrainian and Russian audiences respectively.
The biggest problem with this approach is that it provokes governments to put more pressure on global platforms. One day Twitter was heavily criticised by a Russian official in a pro-Kremlin paper who threatened to block the platform completely. The next day Twitter rushed to block an account of Pravy Sector, one of the most-anti Russian political parties in Ukraine, and blocked it for Russian users.
This article was published on June 20, 2014 at indexoncensorship.org
12 Jun 14 | Europe and Central Asia, Magazine
Twenty five years ago this autumn the Berlin Wall was pulled down and a wave of euphoria swept not just across that city, but across Europe, and then the world. When, also in 1989, Francis Fukuyama wrote we were seeing the “end of history” it seemed to make sense. His essay suggested not that history was over, but a new era was coming, one in which liberal democracy had defeated authoritarianism and the world would now inevitably become more free.
In the wake of the fall, eastern European nations swapped authoritarian regimes for democratic governments. And people who lived behind that wall were now able to travel more easily, read news that had previously been censored, and listen to music that had been forbidden. Many got the chance to vote in their first free election, with a choice of parties, and even had the option not to vote at all.
Bricks were falling and barriers were coming down as that long line of wire and sentry posts that had divided a continent was dismantled.
A quarter of a century on and the bubble of optimism is deflating. The two world superpowers of the 1980s, the US and Russia, are squaring up again, with presidents Putin and Obama exchanging threats and counter threats. In parts of the former Soviet Union little appears to have changed for the better with attacks on gay people, anti-gay legislation and the introduction of blasphemy and anti-swearing laws. In Belarus and Azerbaijan the hope for freedom still exists, but an atmosphere of fear prevails. Journalists there still live in fear of being beaten up, imprisoned or put under house arrest for writing articles that report problems that dictators would rather not have reported. Internet restrictions stop news being distributed, and samizdat, the opposition’s underground newspapers of the Soviet era, continues to exist in Belarus. Further west of Moscow things are better than they were. Freedom to travel, write and read what you want came with the new era. But there are ominous signs. In Hungary there has been a rise in discrimination against minority groups such as the Roma, swastikas painted on Jewish gravestones, and a rise in support for fascist groups. In Poland there are similar reports of upsurges in extremism and homophobia. That initial post-wall swell of enthusiasm for change has been replaced by cynicism and anxiety.
Across Europe a strand of nasty nationalism is striding into the political arena. And weeks after Russia occupied Crimea, and continues to stand at the redrawn borders of Ukraine, the European landscape looks almost as anxious and divided as it did in the days of presidents Reagan and Brezhnev. Fears about a new Cold War feel well founded. If history teaches us anything, it should teach us to expect situations to repeat themselves, and to learn from the past.
History is certainly playing a part in these cycles. The narratives of hate often use a rewriting of history to make their case. “Those people hated us, so now we can hate them,” argues one set. “They supported the Nazis in the war,” argues one more. “The Jews might have had it bad, but it was just as bad for the non-Jewish Poles,” argues another.
A new memorial to a pro-Nazi leader in Hungary has been erected, and writers with far-right connections are now on the country’s school curriculum. Austerity has given the nasty nationalists an opportunity to tell a new story about Europe. It’s too open; it’s too competitive for jobs; our young people don’t have enough opportunities; it’s all the fault of (a group can be named here). And all this creates distant echoes of German voices in the 1930s. Austerity and high levels of unemployment open up an angry fear of a troubled future where people will have less than they have now, often an excuse for popular support for repressive legislation. Politicians and wannabe politicians are drawing out emotional memories of Russia’s fight against the Nazis; WWII victories; and myths of Russia resplendent in centuries past or Hungary split and defeated, then mixing with nostalgia, a cupful of anger and a return to religiosity, in some cases, to present the case for tighter drawn laws that ban free speech or allow states to clampdown on groups they don’t like.
The past is being rewritten.
So, have the expected gains been as nought? In her article for this issue, Irena Maryniak argues that the dividing line in Europe still exists, but it has now shifted further east, along the eastern border of the Baltic states and down the western border of Belarus. To the east there is a greater expectation of conformity and that the group is greater than the individual. There are fault lines where tensions explode and where the push and pull from decades and where arguments about national identity and geo-political pressures result in sudden uprisings and anger. Meanwhile, Konstanty Gebert, who was a leading Solidarity journalist and continues to work as a writer, charts the public’s disillusionment with the “free” press in Poland. He explores why the newly independent media was not as willing to investigate stories as objectively as it should have done, and how people’s trust in the media has dissolved.
Our three German writers on the post-wall era explore different themes. Crime writer Regula Venske looks at the expectation that Germany would have a cohesive national identity by now, but her exploration through crime novels of the country’s image of itself shows a nation more comfortable with itself as regional rather than national. Matthias Biskupek looks back at theatre and literature censored in the former East Germany; while academic and writer Thomas Rothschild has felt his optimism ebb away. Meanwhile Generation Wall, our panel of under 25-year-olds from eastern Europe, speak to their parents’ generation about the past and talk about their present.
Clearly it’s not all bad news. Those members of Generation Wall are mentally and physically well travelled in a way that the older generation was not able to enjoy. They have experienced a life mostly uncensored. Freedom House’s influential Freedom in the World report shows that the number of countries rated as “free” has swept from 61 to 88, and four more than 1989 are rated “partly free”.
And as this year’s Eurovision Song Contest showed there are protests across Europe at the heavy handed tactics of Russian authorities, and at their attitudes to minorities. While a Eurovision audience booing at the Russian contestants or Russia’s neighbours reducing their traditional 12 votes won’t have a long-term effect, it is a sign of an airing of opinions from traditional Russian allies. Bloc voting, so long a tradition in Eurovision, appeared to be breaking down. The end of history has not happened, but learning from the past should never go away.
This article was published in the Summer 2014 issue of Index on Censorship magazine.
02 Jun 14 | Digital Freedom, News and features, Young Writers / Artists Programme
(Image: Shutterstock)
Unlike any previous time in the history of the world, there is a generation growing up today with unprecedented knowledge and power at their immediate and constant disposal. Their voices cannot be silenced, they can communicate with each other instantaneously from anywhere in the world. They are children of the internet, and they are politically and socially empowered in ways that are not yet clearly understood. Increasingly defining their identities online as much as offline, net-powered Millenials are collectively reshaping social norms — defining the legacy their generation will leave society. The internet is a product of, and a critical factor in, this legacy.
For example, the internet is a key medium for personal expression. Deliberately open-access and open-source architectures that transcend national boundaries means that the online world is a place where its users become increasingly accustomed to possessing both a platform and a voice regardless of their status in society. Even where it is dangerous to criticise politicians, or to practice a faith, or to be homosexual, the internet provides shelter in anonymity and the chance to meet like-minded people. In this way, the children of the internet have access to support, advice and assistance, but also to allies. Even the most isolated human can now take action with the power of a collaborative collective rather than as a lone individual, and they do so with an attitude that has become acclimatised to unfettered freedom of speech.
For the internet generation, this translates to their political actions online and often erupts into their offline behaviour, too. Online petitions gain infinitely more traction than their pen-and-paper twins, and the more anarchic side of the internet takes no prisoners in parodying public figures, as evinced recently with the numerous revisions of the recent “beer and bingo” tax cut advertisements produced by the ruling coalition. More controversially, Wikileaks infamously released hundreds of thousands of classified government communiqués, and “hacktivist” groups such as Anonymous make their presence felt with powerful retaliations against firms and governments that they perceive to have suppressed internet freedom. Even high-security sites such as the US Copyright Office and Paypal have been targeted — civil disobedience that is symptomatic of the new, sharing internet generation that is paradoxically mindful of personal privacy and disparaging of public opacity.
For the strongest demonstration of the way this attitude and power translates, look no further than the violent reaction of a primarily young body of protesters during the Arab Spring and in Ukraine. The internet was the conduit through which popular campaigns against ruling regimes transformed into widespread civil disobedience and a full-blown political movement. Empowered with access to forms of political commentary comparatively free of governmental intervention and the ability of every protester to act as a professional journalist by virtue of a camera phone and a Twitter account, the children of the internet communicated, mobilised and acted to cast away governments from Tunisia to Yemen; Egypt twice over. They made their voices heard: not at the ballot box as previous generations might have, but in the streets of Cairo and Sana’a and the virtual spaces of Facebook and Blackberry Messenger. Small wonder then, that governments targeted and blocked social networking sites to quell dissent. In many countries the internet was shut down altogether.
Yet, the internet persevered — as John Gilmore, co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation noted: “The internet treats censorship as a malfunction and routes around it”. Despite the long running tussle between the users of the internet and governments who seek to regulate it, it remains untameable. In each instance, almost immediately after internet usage has been restricted, information has circulated about circumventing government regulations — even total shutdowns have been dodged through external satellite connections.
Powered overwhelmingly by the young, the internet is changing the way our societies are structured. Its effects upon our civilisation are poorly understood, particularly among young people who have never known a world without the internet. Ultimately, however, it has done more for individual freedom than any other development in the last half-century. It grants any person a voice with mere access to a keyboard and a broadband connection. It holds governments to account in new and innovative ways, and most crucially, it is an irreversible development. An entire generation defines itself, subconsciously, through the internet; previous such advancements came only through the invention of the printing press, radio and television. One thing is for certain — as broadband usage approaches saturation in many developed countries, we are all children of the internet now.
This article was originally posted on 2 June, 2014 at indexoncensorship.org
02 May 14 | News and features
A London protest calling for the release of jailed Al Jazeera journalists in Egypt (Image: Index on Censorship)
Press freedom is at a decade low. Considering just a handful of the events of the past year — from Russian crackdowns on independent media and imprisoned journalists in Egypt, to press in Ukraine being attacked with impunity and government reactions to reporting on mass surveillance in the UK — it is not surprising that Freedom House have come to this conclusion in the latest edition of their annual press freedom report. This serves as a stark reminder that press freedom is a right we need to work continuously and tirelessly to promote, uphold and protect — both to ensure the safety of journalists and to safeguard our collective right to information and ability to hold those in power to account. On the eve of World Press Freedom day, we look back at some of the threats faced by the world’s press in the last 12 months.
1) Journalism is not terrorism…
National security has been used as an excuse to crack down on the press this year. “Freedom of information is too often sacrificed to an overly broad and abusive interpretation of national security needs, marking a disturbing retreat from democratic practices,” say Reporters Without Borders (RSF) in their recently released 2014 Press Freedom Index.
Journalists have faced terrorism and national security-related accusations in places known for their somewhat chequered relationship with press freedom, including Ethiopia and Egypt. However, the US and the UK, which have long prided themselves on respecting and protecting civil liberties, have also come under criticism for using such tactics — especially in connection to the ongoing revelations of government-sponsored mass surveillance.
American authorities have gone after former NSA contractor and whistleblower Edward Snowden, tapped the phones of Associated Press staff, and demanded that journalists, like James Risen, reveal their sources. British authorities, meanwhile, detained David Miranda under the country’s Terrorism Act. Miranda is the partner of Glenn Greenwald, the journalist who broke the mass surveillance story. Authorities also raided the offices of the Guardian — a paper heavily involved in reporting in the Snowden leaks.
2) …but governments still like putting journalists in prison
The Al Jazeera journalists detained in Egypt on terrorism-related charges was one of the biggest stories on attacks on press freedom this year. However, Mohamed Fahmy, Baher Mohamed, Peter Greste and their colleagues are far from the only journalists who will spend World Press Freedom Day behind bars. The latest prison census from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) put the number of journalists in jail for doing their job at 211 — their second highest figure on record.
In Bahrain, award-winning photographer Ahmed Humaidan was sentenced in March to ten years in prison. In Uzebekistan, Muhammad Bekjanov, editor of opposition paper Erk, is serving a 19-year sentence — which was increased from 15 in 2012, just as he was due to be released. In Turkey, after waiting seven years, Fusün Erdoğan, former general manager of radio station Özgür Radyo, was last November sentenced to life in jail. Just last Friday, Ethiopian authorities arrested prominent political journalist Tesfalem Waldyes and six bloggers and activists.
3) New media is under attack…
As more journalism is being conducted online, blogs, social and other new media are increasingly being targeted in the suppression of press freedom. Almost half of the world’s jailed journalists work for online outlets, according to the CPJ. China — with its massive censorship apparatus — has continued censoring microblogging site Sina Weibo, while also turning its attention to relative newcomer WeChat. In March, it closed down several popular accounts, including that of investigative journalist Luo Changping.
Meanwhile, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has publicly all but declared war on social media, at one point calling it the “worst menace to society”. Twitter played a big role in last summer’s Gezi Park protests, used by journalists and other protesters alike. Only days ago, Turkish journalist Önder Aytaç was jailed, essentially, because of the letter “k” in a Tweet.
Meanwhile Russia has seen a big crackdown on online news outlets, while legislation recently passed in the Duma is targeting blogs and social media.
4) …and independent media continues to struggle
Only one in seven people in the world live in countries with free press. In many parts of the world, mainstream media is either under tight control by the government itself or headed up media moguls with links to those in power, with dissenting voices within news organisation often being pushed out. Brazil, for instance, has been labelled “the country of 30 Berlusconis” because regional media is “weakened by their subordination to the centres of power in the country’s individual states”. At the start of the year, RIA Novosti — known for on occasion challenging Russian authorities — was liquidated and replaced by the more Kremlin-friendly Rossiya Segodnya (Russia Today), while in Montenegro, has seen efforts by the government to cut funding to critical media. This is not even mentioning countries like North Korea and Uzbekistan, languishing near the bottom of press freedom ratings, where independent journalism is all but non-existent.
5) Attacks on journalists often go unpunished
A staggering fact about the attacks on journalists around the world, is how many happen with impunity. Since 1992, 600 journalists have been killed. Most of the perpetrators of those crimes have not been brought to justice. Attacks can be orchestrated by authorities or by non-state actors, but the lack of adequate responses by those in power “fuels the cycle of violence against news providers,” says RSF. In Mexico, a country notorious for violence against the press, three journalists were murdered in 2013. By last October, the state public prosecutor’s office had yet to announce any progress in the cases of Daniel Martínez Bazaldúa, Mario Ricardo Chávez Jorge and Alberto López Bello, or disclose whether they are linked to their work. Pakistan is also an increasingly dangerous place to work as a journalist. Twenty seven of the 28 journalists killed in the past 11 years in connection with their work have been killed with impunity. Syria, with its ongoing, devastating war, is the deadliest place in the world to be a journalist, while some of the attacks on press during the conflict in Ukraine, have also taken place without perpetrators being held accountable. That attacks in the country appear to be accelerating, CPJ say is “a direct result of the impunity with which previous attacks have taken place”.
This article was published on May 2, 2014 at indexoncensorship.org
