Trademark Claims: The Option Of Choice For Censoring Critics

from the get-to-it dept

Via Michael Scott, we learn about how the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) tried to shut down a blog critical of the group using a trademark claim. While the AFT eventually backed down, after pretty much everyone made it clear that it had no chance to win a trademark claim against a site that was clearly criticizing it, Ron Coleman makes the point that trademark is the "tort of choice for censors." I'd suggest that copyright isn't far behind, but it's really amazing how often trademark holders try to use trademark claims to censor any kind of speech they dislike about their mark. And even if the trademark claim has no chance of winning, it often doesn't matter to those who simply can't afford the time or the money to fight such claims.

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That's Rich: China Accuses Google Of Censorship

from the look-inward... dept

China, of course, is famous for massive censorship of the internet. Google, on the other hand, is well known for fighting censorship in many cases. Even in China, where it was required to block some searches, Google tried to take as permissive an approach as possible, even letting users know when a site was being blocked (yes, this was quite controversial, but the company did more than many other search engines). So, it does seem a bit surprising to see a headline claiming that China is accusing Google of censorship. Isn't that backwards?

It isn't "China" so much as it's the Chinese Communist Party's main newspaper (so, basically, the paper of record from the government) claiming that Google is not finding a report it put out suggesting that Google's book searching project might violate Chinese authors' copyrights. Of course, that claim is a bit amusing as well, given China's general attitude towards copyright over the last couple of decades... but that's another story.

Google claims that it did no censorship at all, and that there was an automated block put on the site via its StopBadware service, which makes sense. Google has long used StopBadware to try to protect users from malware sites, and the service does sometimes make errors. While it seems unlikely that Google would purposely block the report, that doesn't make it any less strange for a Chinese government publication to accuse Google of censorship. Given the government's happy embrace of censorship, how does it have any sort of moral claim here?

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Copyright Used Against Censorship?

from the well,-sorta dept

We've talked a lot about how copyright is used to censor things someone doesn't want, but Michael Scott points us to a story where it's claimed that copyright is being used against censorship. It's over in South Korea, where the authors of a history book are suing their own publisher, after it altered their text based on government demands. The government apparently didn't like sections of the book A Modern and Contemporary History of Korea, and ordered them "revised." The publisher obliged, and the authors are now suing, claiming that it was copyright infringement. Of course, to me, it seems a lot more like this could easily be handled contractually, rather than with copyright law, but if someone wants an example of copyright being used for good, here you go...

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Is A Blogger Strike The Best Way To Fight Back Against Laws Designed To Quiet Bloggers?

from the doesn't-seem-like-it dept

Last month, we wrote about a proposed law in Italy that would likely have serious chilling effects on bloggers and other independent online producers, by setting up fines for not pulling down content if someone accuses the site of defamation (not upon a court verdict, just upon accusation). In response, bloggers throughout Italy went on a "blog strike" to protest the proposed law. However, CitMediaLaw points us to a blog post raising the question of how a blog strike accomplishes that goal? If anything it would seem to do the opposite. By silencing themselves, and not talking about the issues, it keeps those issues out of the discussion for whatever period of time. Instead of silencing, why not do what the bloggers do best and talk about the problems of the law so that many more people are aware of them?

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Iraq The Latest To Push For Internet Censorship

from the freedom-not-to-express dept

Looks like Iraq is the latest country to have politicians look to put in place widespread internet censorship rules, and it's upsetting a lot of people there, who see it as an assault on their (only recently granted) right to free expression. Politicians are looking at banning books, as well, claiming they need to stop the dangerous influence some of these books and websites present. It would be interesting to see if there were actually any studies on how effective such things are. I think the folks most likely to be influenced by such things are pretty likely to get around the blocks -- and actually interpret the blocks themselves as more evidence that the blocked content is valid. I doubt bans on such material actually slows its influence. However, it would be interesting if there were actually any research on this topic. Know of any?

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Italy Proposes Law To Force Bloggers To Take Down Content Claimed To Be 'Defamatory'

from the silencing-dissent dept

We've noticed in the past that there have been an awful lot of questionable anti-internet laws proposed in Italy over the past few years, and it appears that's not ending any time soon. The latest, as pointed out by CitMediaLaw is a proposed new law that would potentially fine bloggers as much as $18,000 if they do not remove content called defamatory within in a short period of time. Note that this is not content that a lawsuit finds to be defamatory, but merely content that someone declares to be defamatory. In other words, it's a great way to force bloggers to delete any content someone doesn't like. As the article notes, with so much of the mainstream media in the country owned by the Prime Minister himself, having alternative outlets for news and information is important -- but this bill would put serious chilling effects on those alternative outlets. In response, a bunch of bloggers have apparently gone on "strike" and refused to post content one day to protest the proposed law.

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Googling For Porn Makes You Absent Minded?

from the well-that-explains-it dept

With China trying to stop Google from helping internet users find pornography, it appears that China has picked up its propaganda campaign. Boing Boing points us to the news that a guy quoted as part of a "man on the street" interview by China's state-owned TV news network claimed that searching for porn online can make you absent-minded:

"I have this fellow student and he's been curious about these kinds of things. He visited porn Web sites and ended up becoming absent-minded for a while."

Very convincing. Apparently, lots of other people weren't convinced by the guy's performance, and looked into his background... and discovered that he just happens to be a student intern at the very same TV news network that was asking the questions. So, if you can't find a man on the street to give you the answers that you want, apparently China finds someone they can coach.

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German Elected Official Switches Parties To The Pirate Party

from the getting-some-attention... dept

Last week, we noted that Germany may be following Australia down the very slippery slope of internet censorship with a secret blacklist of websites that ISPs must block. Not surprisingly, not all politicians in Germany support such a move, and one, Jorg Tauss, was apparently so upset by it, that he's left his own political party and signed on with the German Pirate Party instead, recognizing that being against such forms of censorship is a key plank of the party's platform. That said, the article notes that Tauss may not exactly be what the party is looking for, as he's under a cloud of speculation concerning a supposed investigation into child porn on his computer. He claims that the content was sent to him while he was investigating such content in his role as an elected official, but it could still raise questions, and pending the outcome of the investigation could potentially harm the Pirate Party's reputation if the story is different than his official one.

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Dear China: It's Not Google That Is Producing Or Hosting Porn

from the understanding-how-the-internet-works-is-useful dept

We've noted in the past that the Great Firewall of China basically works via a threat model. Basically, the government tells ISPs that if they fail to block "undesirable" content, then they'll get in trouble. Then, they may get notes about what type of content is "undesirable" but for the most part it's left up to them to figure it out, but if any "bad stuff" gets through, they know they can get in trouble, so they tend to overblock. Earlier this year, China warned various search engines that they too needed to comply with such rules, and that it was upset that people could find "bad stuff" via those search engines.

Apparently Google didn't pay enough attention, because the Chinese gov't has "disabled" parts of Google in China because (they claim) people can still access pornographic content (and other "undesirable" content, one imagines). However, what's interesting is the assumption that links on Google represent content Google has control over. As one of our readers, Ben, points out, it appears that the Chinese gov't regularly implies that Google "owns" the content that it links to:

The China Internet Illegal Information Reporting Center, had criticized the search engine for its erotic content and threatened punishment from the government. The group had said that Google had already been warned twice, in January and April, about its content.

And there you have the problem. The content isn't Google's and it makes no sense to claim that it is or to punish Google's spiders for finding and indexing it.

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China Says Its Okay For Users To Delete Its New Censorware

from the wasn't-expecting-that dept

Well, this is certainly something of a surprise. Earlier this month, China required new censorware be installed on all computers sold there. Of course, this upset a bunch of people and also raised serious security concerns. Still, we didn't expect the Chinese gov't to back down. However, a variety of lawsuits and public protests in China has resulted in at least some backing down by the government. The gov't is now saying that while the software will come installed on all new PCs, there's no requirement that it be used. Of course, it's not at all clear how easy it is to disable the software. The software is apparently uninstallable (or so the makers claim), but this new statement from the government makes it clear that there shouldn't be sanctions against those who do go through with the uninstall.

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Is Germany Following Australia Down The Slippery Slope Of Internet Censorship?

from the hopefully-not dept

Via Slashdot we learn that Germany is the latest country to consider a censorship regime that would create a blacklist of sites that ISPs would be required to block. As with most such things, the official claim is that this would be to block out child porn. Of course, this is a head-in-the-sand approach to fighting child porn. It's about trying to pretend it's not there, rather than tracking down those actually responsible. Those who really want access will find it elsewhere through non-blocked sites or groups. Except now it will be more underground and harder to track. But, more importantly, in setting up any sort of secret censored list, you can pretty much guarantee that the list will be abused. A similar attempt in Australia, where again everyone was told it was about stopping child exploitation, was recently revealed to have a lot of other stuff on the list -- such that only 1/3 was actually about preventing child porn. The article linked above shows that Germans have teamed up to protest such a censorship regime -- and have done so in a very constructive manner -- suggesting much more reasonable alternatives. Now we just need to see if politicians recognize that there are better solutions before just jumping on the easy censorship "for the children" bandwagon.

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China's New Censorware Software Has Serious Security Flaws

from the is-that-a-surprise? dept

This probably doesn't come as much of a surprise to anyone, but China's new mandated censorware that is required to be installed on all new PCs sold in the country has serious security flaws that put users' computers (and their data) at risk. Of course, censorware/spyware type software almost always does that -- and, it seems likely that the Chinese government isn't all that concerned about the privacy of citizens and their computer usage. Still, the bigger fear is that the security flaws can (and will) be used to basically hijack all those computers and turn them into a botnet. That should certainly be a bigger concern, especially given the Chinese governments' insistence that it wants to crackdown on the widespread use of Chinese servers for spamming operations anyway.

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Dear People Offended By Books; Requesting Permission To Burn Them Will Drive More Attention To Them

from the that's-not-what-you-want dept

A reader named Frosty840 points out that, if you thought the idea of a good old fashioned "book burning" had gone out of style in the US, a group of offended individuals in Wisconsin are petitioning the local library for permission to burn its only copy of a book called Baby Be-Bop. A book burning? Apparently it hasn't occurred to these offended folks that (beyond the disgrace of wanting to burn books they dislike), this entire action has only served to call a lot more attention to that book. The folks asking for the right to burn the book, are also demanding $120,000 for "being exposed to the book in a library display," which seems likely to (again) only drive much more interest in the book. A book that can cause that much damage? Where can I get my copy?

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Minnesota Gives In; Won't Block Gambling Sites

from the good-for-them dept

Back in April, the state of Minnesota tried to force ISPs to block certain gambling websites. Similar attempts had been tried in a few other states, and quickly shot down by the courts -- and it didn't take long for a lawsuit to emerge in Minnesota. However, the good news is that the state has apparently agreed to back down rather than trying to fight a bogus and costly lawsuit. Basically, it sounds like enough lawyers explained to state officials that their likelihood of winning was pretty slim -- so the state just folded. At least they didn't keep trying to waste taxpayer money trying to fight for such censorship.

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Local Version Of China's Great Firewall Now Required On All PCs In China

from the yeah,-that'll-work... dept

There have been plenty of stories on the inner workings of China's "Great Firewall," whereby various ISPs are threatened with liability if they don't block "bad stuff." Yet, it's all been done at the ISP level. Apparently, that's about to change. A report is making the rounds that, as of July 1st, all PCs sold in China will be required to have client-side censorship software. You have to wonder if the censorship software also includes spying software.... Either way, you have to imagine it won't take long at all for people to figure out how to disable such software.

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eMusic Trying To Censor Critics Of New Pricing Plan? [Updated... And Again]

from the not-smart dept

We just wrote about the PR nightmare facing eMusic for announcing both a price increase and its first major record label signing at the same time -- leading many to assume that the price increase was due to the Sony Music deal. Some in our comments pointed out that eMusic subscribers were protesting in a variety of places -- including on Twitter, where they were using the hashtag (used to designate a unique cause or event): #emusicfail. And, as usually happens in such situations, many of the hundreds of commenters on eMusic's own blog post on the deal mentioned the Twitter hashtag, and encouraged others to start using it as well, while making their protests public. So, how did eMusic address these angry customers?

It apparently made them disappear. [see update below]

A commenter on our post, pointed us to a comment on the eMusic blog noting that all of the comments that mentioned the Twitter tag had been deleted by eMusic -- not only wiping out signs of the protest, but also screwing up the numbers of comments, which made the conversation confusing, since people are referring to other comments with the wrong number now.

So, rather than address the fact that there are a ton of angry protesters, eMusic simply decided to pretend they don't exist? It's hard to see that ending well.

Update: eMusic got in touch to say that they have not blocked or deleted any comments, and suggest that it may have been an issue with CAPTCHA problems not allowing comments to post rather than any actual intent to block conversation on the subject. The company also notes that it has responded to the complaints, though I'm not sure it really addresses the specific complaints from subscribers.

Update 2: There is growing evidence that the original post was correct, and eMusic's response was false, though we're still trying to clarify. Someone has detailed examples of comments moving up (which would happen if other comments above it were deleted) and also, perhaps the most damning of all is that, as of the time of this update, there's a 13 count discrepancy between the number of comments listed under the post, and the actual number of comments. It certainly sounds like 13 comments were deleted, though eMusic insists that it has not removed any comments.

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Is Anyone Actually Surprised That China Has Blocked Social Media Sites For Tiananmen Anniversary?

from the great-firewall-at-work dept

To be honest, stories about China using its "Great Firewall" to block certain sites are hardly new. They've been happening for years. And yet, tons of people have been submitting variations on the news that China appears to have upped the blockade by including sites like Twitter, Flickr, Hotmail and the new Microsoft search engine Bing, recognizing that it's the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown which is (not surprisingly) expected to draw quite an online discussion. I wasn't going to write anything about it, but a few thoughts occurred to me, as more and more people submitted it:

• Is anyone actually surprised that this has happened? China regularly bans and unbans a variety of different sites, often based on what's happening in the news. To think that it wouldn't raise the gates for such an event seems naive.
• Does it really do any good for the Chinese gov't? It pisses off those who use those services who are in China, certainly, but it also serves to call more attention to the heavy hand of gov't censorship in that country. Now, many don't seem to care one way or another -- and so it doesn't impact those people either way. But for those who do care, it reinforces their feelings about it, but hardly stops news from spreading.

So in the end, I'm still left wondering what the gov't thinks it accomplishes in being so heavy handed in censoring such sites, other than thinking that if they stick fingers in their ears, they can pretend no one's talking about this stuff online.

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Less Than A Third Of Australia's Censor List Actually About Underage Images

from the moral-panic-for-censorship dept

For years and years and years, the Australian government has been looking to come up with a rationale for censoring the internet. The most recent plan has gone through some hiccups with mass protests. But, of course, the gov't has continued to push on, claiming that such a censored blacklist is important to stop child porn. Except... a few months back, the censored list was leaked, and a review of the list now shows that less than 32% of the sites were actually about child porn (via Michael Scott).

This is one of the (many) reasons why such secret blacklists are always a bad idea. Given the opportunity to censor content, it's too tempting not to expand the list with general stuff the censors "don't like" rather than the actual intended purpose of the list. And that, of course, is why gov'ts always insist that such lists should be secret rather than publicly reviewable. Of course, it's worth noting that as part of the admission that the list has such a small percentage of what was supposed to make up the entire list, the Australian government says that it's having the police look into the leak of the list. Why? The only thing the leak exposed was how the gov't was lying to the public. That shouldn't be illegal. That should be welcomed whistle-blowing of gov't abuse.

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Surprise: Beijing Court Sides With Victim Of Internet Censorship

from the didn't-expect-that dept

Lots of people know about the infamous "Great Firewall" of China, where internet censorship is quite common -- and citizens are, at times, encouraged to help alert authorities to any questionable content online. Government-directed censorship is quite common and expected, so it's a bit surprising to see a Beijing court side with the victim of censorship (via Michael Scott). The case didn't directly involve the government, but an ISP that took down the website of an economics professor, Hu Xingdou, who often discussed corruption and police brutality on his website. Of course, one of the ways in which the gov't gets the Great Firewall to work is by threatening to hold ISPs liable if they don't censor unwanted content -- so those ISPs have plenty of pressure to over-censor to avoid liability. However, in this case, the court actually found that the ISP failed to show proof of "illegal content" on the professor's website while also failing to show that it had first asked the professor to remove any illegal content, as required by its terms of service.

As the article notes, this may now put ISPs in something of a bind. The gov't may hold them liable if they fail to censor certain content, but the courts may push back and hold them liable for being too aggressive in their censorship.

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Why Are Australia's Would-Be 'Net Censors So Opposed To Transparency?

from the let's-try-the-best-of-disinfectants,-shall-we? dept

A lot of people have been submitting the news that Wikileaks has obtained and published the secret black-list of websites to be banned under Australia's proposed Internet censoring exercise. The list of more than 2300 websites is about half child pornography and half "online poker sites, YouTube links, regular gay and straight porn sites, Wikipedia entries, euthanasia sites, websites of fringe religions such as satanic sites, fetish sites, Christian sites, the website of a tour operator and even a Queensland dentist."

As Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, explains, by making these lists secret and threatening to fine disclosure of the list at $11,000 per day, the democracy of Australia is "invariably corrupted." There is no due process to to add sites to the list, or to remove them, and as previous leaked lists show, even censorship systems set up to block legitimately illegal sites end up being abused. As web censorship scholar Derek Bambauer has written, an Internet censorship regime should be judged on openness, transparency, narrowness and accountability, but by keeping the list secret and threatening those who would allow democratic deliberation about its contents, Australia's web censors undermine the political process of a democracy.

Kevin Donovan is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Kevin Donovan and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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