Google would welcome government support in challenging Chinese censorhip

Google wants the Obama administration to take China’s censorship of Google to the World Trade Organization as an unfair barrier to trade. -db

Bloomberg News
March 3, 2010
By Mark Drajem

(Bloomberg) — The Obama administration is weighing the merits of taking China’s censorship of Google Inc. to the World Trade Organization as an unfair barrier to trade, a [...]

Apple bans apps with adult content

Concerned about keeping the content of apps appropriate for the large number of children and teenagers using iPod Touch and expected to buy the new iPad due soon, Apple has responded to parents’ complaints and removed certain apps from its App Store. -db

The New York Times
February 23, 2010
By Jenna Wortham

Apple has started banning many applications [...]

YouTube removes work with artistic nudity claiming it fails to conform with community standards

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the National Coailtion Against Censorship is asking YouTube to restore the work of renowned video artist Amy Greenfield to YouTube. YouTube removed her work with some nudity claiming it failed to satisfy YouTube Community Guidelines. -db

Electronic Frontier Foundation
Commentary
February 22, 2010
By Kurt Opsahl

Today EFF and the National Coalition Against Censorship [...]

TV cable broadcasts of city council meeting in Norwalk censored

During broadcasts of its meetings on a government access cable channel, the Norwalk City Council blacks out public comments. Legal experts says the practice is legal but express dismay that the council feels it’s necessary to censor the public. -db
The Los Angeles Times
February 20, 2010
By Jeff Gottlieb
Like most towns, Norwalk broadcasts its City Council meetings [...]

Iranians bloggers and journalists face death sentence

In anticipation of the Islamic Revolution’s 31st anniversary on February 11, Iranian authorities are blocking the internet and prosecuting bloggers and journalists. -db
MediaShift
February 9, 2010
By Clothilde Le Coz

Iranian authorities are once agan cracking down on the Internet.
Internet connection speeds were degraded in several cities in advance of the Islamic Revolution’s 31st anniversary on February 2. This [...]

Tickets may carry additional price tag – your rights to free expression

A senior staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation says that event planners have used contract law to restrict the rights of their patrons to avoid the limits of trademarks and copyright law. -db

Electronic Frontier Foundation
Commentary
February 5, 2010
By Corynne McSherry

As part of our Terms of Ab(use) project, we pay close attention to the fine print of [...]

Recent ruling shows Hazelwood limiting teacher speech

A January 22 ruling in federal district court in New York shows that Hazelwood can limit teacher’s speech as well as student’s. The court ruled that a teacher could not wear a political campaign button. -db

First Amendment Center
Commentary
January 30, 2010
By David L. Hudson Jr.
When First Amendment advocates hear the name Hazelwood School District v. [...]

Tech companies must share burden with media companies in fighting for global Internet freedom

The Electronic Frontier Foundation cites seven corporations that should share the task with Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft in fighting for Internet freedom. The EFF points out that the companies are selling technology to the Chinese government used for spying, censorship, invading privacy, and intimidating citizens. -db
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Opinion
February 1, 2010
By Danny O’Brien

Secretary of State Hillary [...]

Blogger charges that U.S. government enabled Chinese hackers in Google case

National security technology blogger Bruce Schneier wrote recently that as part of their domestic spying campaign, the United States required internet providers to set up avenues for government surveillance used recently by some parties in China to breach the privacy of Google customers. -DB

Citizen Media Law Project
Opinion
January 26, 2010
By Arthur Bright

If you’re a regular user [...]

Big Brother is alive: Chinese government to monitor text messages for ‘unhealthy content’

The Chinese government continues its campaign to bring the the cyber world under its control by announcing that it will check cell phone messages and punish users for “unhealthy content”. -DB
The New York Times
January 20, 2010
By Sharon LaFraniere
BEIJING — As the Chinese government expands what it calls a campaign against pornography, cellular companies [...]

Secretary of State makes major address declaring internet freedom a basic human right

Hillary Clinton warned that a new information curtain is descending across the world, electronic barriers comprised of censorship and surveillance. -DB

Wired
Commentary
January 21, 2010
By Nathan Hodge
It was almost too easy. In a major speech today on net freedom, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reached back to Winston Churchill — and to Ronald Reagan — in arguing [...]

Supreme Court finds key part of campaign finance law unconstitutional

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the McCain-Feingold finance law violated the free speech rights of corporations to spend as much as they wished to back or oppose political candidates. -DB
Courthouse News Service
January 21, 2010
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Supreme Court today killed a central part of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law and ruled that [...]

Growing numbers scale China’s digital wall

Chinese citizens are finding ways to get around China’s firewalls after the government shut down pornography sites, blogs, online video sites, Facebook, and Twitter during the Beijing Olympics. -DB

The New York Times
January 16, 2010
By Brad Stone and David Barboza

The Great Firewall of China is hardly impregnable.
Just as Mongol invaders could not be stopped by the [...]

New California student free press law aims to stop prior restraint of student publications in charter schools

The adviser of a high school newspaper in Orange County, California says a revised publication policy at the charter school, the Orange County High School of the Arts, is in conflict with a proposed state law inspired by alleged censorship problems at the school.-DB

Student Press Law Center
January 13, 2010
By Stefanie Dazio

ORANGE COUNTY, Calif. — [...]

U.S. looking at issues of internet freedom after alleged Chinese cyberattack on Google accounts

After Google announced this week that hackers had tried to penetrate Gmail accounts in China including those of U.S. financial institutions and defense contractors, the Obama administration is considering their options in maintaining internet freedom. -DB
NextGov
January 13, 2010
By Aliya Sternstein
An alleged cyberattack by the Chinese government into systems operated by Google and other U.S. [...]

TSA puts heat on blogger posting new screening procedures

Armed agents from the Transportation Security Administration visited two bloggers in their homes with subpoenas, seeking the identity of the source who provided a document revising screening procedures for airports after the recent aborted bombing attempt by a Nigerian man. -DB

Wired
Threat Level
December 30, 2009
By Kim Zetter

Two bloggers received home visits from Transportation Security Administration agents [...]

Darkness Award highlight: California school district pays for censorship of student newspaper

The Fallbrook Union High School District who censored the student newspaper, cancelled the journalism program and reassigned the newspaper adviser agreed to pay the adviser $7,500 and reimburse the ACLU and its law firm $20,000 for legal costs. In October the First Amendment Coalition awarded its Darkness Award to Rod King, the principal responsible for [...]

Australia: Professor challenges proposed internet filter for stopping child porn

A Perth university professor says that the internet filter under consideration in parliament will not succeed in protecting children and would block a wide range of content thereby allying Australia with the most repressive countries in censoring internet content. -DB

The Sidney Morning Herald
December 17, 2009
By Lelia Green

SIDNEY, Australia – Senator Stephen Conroy’s internet filter is unlikey [...]

Government worker fired for criticism unrelated to his job of Guantanamo military commissions

Col. Morris Davis, former prosecutor for the Guantanamo military commissions, was fired from the Congressional Research Service after he wrote opinion pieces critical of the commissions that appeared in the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. -DB
American Civil Liberties Union
Opinion
December 4, 2009
By Rachel Myers

The ACLU sent a letter to the Library of Congress and [...]

China trip: Obama’s call for greater Internet freedom gets mixed reception

Chinese citizens were glad to hear U.S. President Barack Obama’s support for greater Internet freedom in China but were skeptical about the impact of his comments. The Chinese government censored the comments on the official news agency and deleted them from Web sites. -DB
Radio Free Asia
November 17, 2009

SHANGHAI — Chinese Internet users gave mixed reactions [...]

Supreme Court refuses to hear Miami book banning case

In refusing to hear a Miami book  banning case, the Supreme Court left in place a ruling by a federal appeals court that the Miami school board could remove a book from the school libraries because it presented too rosy a picture of life in Cuba under the communists. -DB
Miami Herald
November 16, 2009
By Kathleen [...]

Reporters Without Borders director urges President to pressure China on web censorship

During his Asian trip, the Washington director of Reporters Without Borders urges Obama to privately raise the issues of web censorship and oppression of journalists and bloggers to the Chinese government. -DB
MediaShift
Commentary
November 10, 2009
By Clothilde Le Coz
In China, Google is forced to censor its search engine, Facebook and Twitter are blocked, U.S. news agencies [...]

Military prohibits images of troops killed in action in Afghanistan

New rules governing journalists embedded in a military unit in Afghanistan prohibit photos or videos of U.S. troops killed in action. This revises early guidelines allowing images of death so long as the Department of Defense had notified  the troops’ family. -DB
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
October 9, 2009
By Amanda Becker
The agreement journalists [...]

Press freedom under fire in Latin America

In recent months journalists have suffered setbacks in Ecuador, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia, Brazil and Argentina as courts and leaders move to restrict coverage and demonize the press. -DB
The New York Times
August 31, 2009
By Alexei Barrionuevo
RIO DE JANEIRO — For the family of José Sarney, Brazil’s Senate president, the daily onslaught of newspaper reports about nepotism [...]

Lawyer of right wing blogger claims FBI paid client to make threats

The lawyer for a New Jersey hate blogger charged with threatening to kill judges and lawmakers said his client was paid by the FBI to make his online rants. -DB
Wired
August 19, 2009
By David Kravets
A notorious New Jersey hate blogger charged in June with threatening to kill judges and lawmakers was secretly an FBI “agent provocateur” [...]

Venezuelan president clamping down on media

A United States unclassified intelligence report says that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is aggressively silencing his media critics, including bloggers. He has proposed a law that would make it a crime to report on anything the government finds objectionable.  -DB
Open Source Center
Analysis
August 3, 2009
President Chavez’s government is moving forcefully to silence critics by introducing a Media Crimes [...]

Federal court reverses ruling that upheld government exclusion of leading Muslim world scholar

The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in favor of U.S. organizations when the government excludes foreign scholars, artists, politicians from the U.S. holding that the organizations have a First Amendment right to hear and speak with those individuals. -DB
American Civil Liberties Union
Press Release
July 17, 2009
NEW YORK – A federal appeals court today found that [...]