Kuwait has asked BlackBerry’s Canadian maker RIM to block pornographic sites though they will not suspend the messenger services like their Gulf neighbours.
RIM have agreed to block 3,000 porn sites and have promised to do so by the end of this year.
Jamal Khashoggi has stepped down as editor-in-chief of al-Watan after the progressive Saudi newspaper published a controversial opinion piece criticising Salafism. Arab news sources speculate he was forced to resign, the Saudi authorities adher to Wahabbism, a form of Salafi Islam. Khashoggi was abroad when the article was published, and has since denounced the article, saying it was an error to publish it.
The Saudi Arabian government broke the Arabic record for the fastest time to block a new website, clocking in at just 15 hours. On 25 April, they blocked a US- based site created by Egyptian activists The Egyptian Association for Change, eacusa.org, only 15 hours after it launched. Tunisia was the previous record holder, blocking www.yezzi.org in 18 hours after it went live in 2005.
Saudi Arabia has begun blocking the Twitter pages of activists in the country. Human rights lawyer Waleed Abulkhair and businessman Khaled al Nasser said their Twitter pages have been blocked since about Monday by the official government Internet censor. This is apparently the first move against known Twitter users inside the kingdom. The men involved claim this is because the government has been made aware of the sites power after its role in the Iran elections. Read more here