Category Archives: Internet

Bush meets with international bloggers

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On the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, President Bush met with eight bloggers and new media users from China, Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, Egypt and Belarus.

The White House said Bush planned to discuss “the challenges they confront in overcoming censorship.”

Six of the individuals met with Bush at the White House; participants from Egypt and Venezuela joined by teleconference.

The White House also highlighted the efforts of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to aid citizen journalists. BBG oversees international radio broadcasters such as Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and Radio Farda, as well as television networks like Alhurra and TV Marti.

BBG news outlets are getting reports out of heavily censored countries by getting citizen journalists to submit information from cell phones, SMS feeds and e-mails, and encouraging participation in its radio, television and blog discussions.

Partnering with nongovernmental organizations, BBG also has developed free anti-censorship software and technical tools that are available in English, Persian, Kazakh, Mandarin and Vietnamese. A BBG spokesperson said users can go to one of those language sites and sign up to get updates, which include information “alerting people to work arounds” for the ongoing battle with the state censors.

Taking advantage of the wide open blogosphere

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My (Freedom of Expression’s) very first entry, “Blogs self-regulate to stay credible,” pointed out that bloggers have a vested interest in being honest if they want to build and maintain an audience.

But when money is involved, it seems bloggers might need something more than mere self-policing.

Someone identified as “Johntw” posted a bogus story October 3 saying Apple CEO and founder Steve Jobs had suffered a heart attack, sending the company’s shares plunging more than 10 percent before Apple could quash the rumors.

The story appeared on CNN’s iReport, which some, such as TechNewsWorld’s Renay San Miguel, believe helped add to its credibility. Yet CNN only requires a valid e-mail address in order to post, and the only other information it can now provide to investigators at the Securities and Exchange Commission is the sender’s IP address.

If “Johntw” was doing some day trading on Wall Street, it is estimated he/she could have netted as much as $21 million by buying up Apple’s temporarily devalued shares with the knowledge that they would go right back up once the truth was exposed.

San Miguel, as a former CNN anchor, predicts that because of the Apple fiasco, the staff at iReport will now be vetting all submissions from the public.

“It may be a hassle and colossal time-suck to do it, and the company certainly won’t make a big deal about it, but it will do it. Because in the end, the people in charge of the network really do care about credibility,” he says.

Where do you think the line should be drawn? Can the blogosphere be a self-regulated news source or should measures be put in place to prevent people from exploiting its free-wheeling nature?

Former Federal Reserve chair ties press freedom to economic stability

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How does press freedom factor into current global concerns over the financial markets and the drying up of credit?

I just went to a conference that discussed the relationship between the economy and the rule of law. Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan was featured as the keynote speaker. (See “Former Federal Reserve Chairman Predicts Economic Rebound.”)

In the middle of his remarks on how legal guarantees accorded to property rights and ownership have elevated general standards of living since the early 18th century, Greenspan pointed to how a free press, along with the protection of minority rights, has proven “the most effective form to safeguard [private] property.”

His argument is that the watchdog role of the press and its ability to inform the population contribute to economic stability.

“[D]emocracies rarely allow discontent to rise to a point that leads to explosive changes in economic regimes,” he said. This stands in contrast with authoritarian states that, even if operating under a capitalist economy, are “inherently unstable because [discontent] forces aggrieved citizens to seek redress outside the law.”

He quoted Nobel laureate Amartya Sen’s observation that “no substantial famine has ever occurred in any independent and democratic country with a relatively free press.”

Why is this? According to Greenspan, it’s because the news media in authoritarian regimes tend towards self-censorship. “[M]arket-interventionist policies – the most prevalent cause of disrupted distribution of food – go unreported and uncorrected until too late.”

So, if you’re living in a society with a relatively free press, consider the possibility that all the gloomy stories you’re reading about the economy might be helping to prevent an even greater crisis.

The handbook oppressive regimes don’t want you to read

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In a recent interview with an Iranian journalist and blogger who now lives in Canada, I asked how Iranian bloggers protect themselves from government authorities that are increasing restrictions, intensifying scrutiny, and raising the cost of getting caught.   (See “Heretic” Bloggers Risk Execution Under Iran’s New Restrictions.)

He said many bloggers use “anonymizers” to hide their Internet protocol (IP) addresses, but lamented that there was no online manual to instruct new bloggers on how to change their IP address, get around filtering, and create closed blog communities.

I’m sure he will share my delight in discovering that Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has put together a Handbook for Bloggers and Cyber-Dissidents that covers everything from getting started to blog ethics to defensive strategies. It’s available in English, Persian, Spanish, Chinese, Arabic and French.

“Bloggers cause anxiety,” it reads. “Governments are wary of these men and women, who post news without officially being journalists. Worse, they frequently raise sensitive issues which the media, now known as ‘traditional,’ dare not cover.”

The handbook advises those who wish to blog anonymously to set up their accounts under pseudonyms from a public-access computer. It gives instructions on the use of proxy servers such as Tor and advice on how to cover your tracks.

If you live in a country that censors parts of the Internet, RSF also has a section on circumvention systems and how to “tunnel” to a computer in a unfiltered location. All this information is accompanied by plenty of warning that users might soon find themselves dealing with very unhappy government authorities.

For a laugh (or a cry), check out the 2008 “Golden Scissors” awards at the very end for the most effective authoritarian regime actions against the online activities of their citizens.

Cyberwarfare in Georgia conflict disturbingly simple

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As Georgia’s geographic boundaries were being crossed by Russian forces, many of Georgia’s official Web sites were attacked. The Georgian National Bank and President Mikhail Saakashvili’s sites were disabled, and the foreign ministry’s homepage was defaced with photos of the president next to Adolph Hitler.

When Georgia accused Russian bloggers of being behind the attacks, Estonia, which suffered its own cyberattacks during a 2007 dispute with Russia, offered some of its expertise to help out. In the meantime, some Russian media outlets and separatist Web sites in South Ossetia also reported cyberattacks.

After hearing rumors that hackers were receiving their orders from the Russian government, Slate.com writer Evgeny Morozov enlisted himself as a Russian “cybersoldier” in a research project to “test how much damage someone like me, who is quite aloof from the Kremlin physically and politically, could inflict upon Georgia’s Web infrastructure.”

It was pretty easy. After only two or three minutes, Morozov found a way to get his Internet browser to overload a list of Georgian Web sites by automatically sending them thousands of queries. Hacking is a game that almost anyone with a political axe to grind can play.

Bobbie Johnson of The Guardian, a British newspaper, is troubled by the chaos of “hacktivism,” as he describes the grassroots movement. When cyberwarfare shuts down a Web page, it affects governments and news media outlets as well as individual users. And, as shown by the Morozov example, much of the Internet is pretty vulnerable.

That’s Johnson’s critical point. Today the justification for cyberattacks is a nationalist war. Once it’s over, hackers’ next targets could be whatever they felt like going after when they got out of bed that particular morning.

So, instead of imagining hackers as patriotic fighters, Johnson advises seeing them as “a mob of untraceable louts who cause havoc for no real reason other than they can. Think of them as unruly, unhinged and unrepentant – just like the worst trolls you’ve encountered.”

For more about developments in Georgia, see Georgia in Crisis.

Last U.S. bastion of traditional reporting breached

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Like other reporters, White House correspondents are being drawn into blogging and videography. For some of the more traditional journalists, the better verb might be “dragged.”

The National Journal’s Alexis Simendinger, herself a regular in the Brady Press Briefing Room, describes her workplace as “one of the last protected habitats for inverted-pyramid mainstream journalism” which is now “tiptoeing” in the direction of blogs and “writing that entertains and mixes analysis with news.”

And it’s not just written products. Uncharacteristically armed with a video camera, Ken Herman from Cox Newspapers recently gave his readers the insider’s view on what it’s like to be a White House pool reporter on Air Force One. (It’s boring.)

The White House press corps includes some of America’s most seasoned journalists, many of whom doubt the wisdom of ditching newspaper articles in favor of “bite-sized appetizers of information” that “are supposed to be more Cheez Whiz than escargot” as Simendinger describes.

The Houston Chronicle’s Julie Mason, one of the first to make the transition to blogging, albeit reluctantly, remembers being relentlessly mocked by her colleagues.

“It was superficial and trivial … we were trend monkeys, and it was the dumbing-down of everything we hold dear. I had worries about the same things,” she said. Over time, the freedom of writing informally and the direct interactions with her readers gave her a more favorable view of the blogosphere.

The remaining holdouts eventually might have to surrender. Blogs are attracting new visitors to newspaper Web sites and, as the Washington Times’ Stephen Dinan once asked, “Who nowadays is honestly reading a newspaper article from beginning to end?” The Chicago Tribune’s Mark Silva, as quoted in Simendinger’s article, might be right about the 21st-century news business. “The news cycle is just not sufficient anymore. You can’t put something out in the morning paper and expect it to be competitive.”

What do you think? Are blogs the death knell for real journalism or is there room for peaceful coexistence?

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More advice for journalists covering the Olympics

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The international news media discovered to their consternation July 29 that Chinese censorship of the Internet will not be taking an Olympic holiday. So any online research you’d like to do on sensitive topics like Tibet, Tiananman Square or the Falun Gong had best be done before getting on the plane to Beijing.

But there is hope. U.S.-based Network World has some ideas to help you protect your access to information and hang on to information you’ve collected.

Hints in the article, Top Ten Ways to protect your Data at the Beijing Olympics, range from the obvious – “Keep your laptops, PDAs and cell phones within sight at all times” – to encryption advice and links to anonymizer sites designed to hide your Internet activity.

China’s Internet restrictions seem at odds with its pledge to allow free reporting during the Games. At the White House, press secretary Dana Perino said that Chinese Internet access has grown, but “China would be enhanced and continue to prosper if it allowed for more freedoms.”

President Bush will be attending the opening ceremonies in Beijing, but Perino said he also plans to talk to Chinese leaders about human rights, democracy and Internet freedom.

Do you have hints you’d like to share, or stories of bad experiences you can help others avoid? Please express them!

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Covering the Beijing Olympics? Don’t forget your survival guide.

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The Olympics might be the “ultimate choreographed event” according to Human Rights Watch, which estimates 25,000 journalists will be coming to China in August to cover the 2008 summer games.

This longstanding critic of the Chinese government has published a “survival guide” for sports journalists who stray into sensitive topics or find themselves confused as to their rights or how to respond to being monitored by the authorities.

One of the reasons many countries compete for the honor of hosting the games is their hope for prominent, positive media coverage. According to the Human Rights Watch guide, Olympics reporting “invariably includes coverage of the host country, its challenges, its policies, and the context in which the Games take place.” It anticipates “some of the most important stories will be found outside of sporting venues.”

But covering China’s culture and society in a manner that meets the professional standards of journalism could prove challenging for reporters not used to the sort of restrictions the Chinese government imposes. The guide gives practical advice such as documents to carry and useful contacts inside the country. It also offers background on human rights issues and stresses the importance of protecting Chinese contacts.

The release of the guide seems to underscore Human Rights Watch’s skepticism of assurances by Wang Wei, secretary-general of the Beijing Olympic Games Bid Committee, who promised the international media “complete freedom to report when they come to China” when the country made its Olympic bid in 2001.

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Press freedom organization preserves memory of slain Lebanese journalist

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More than three years after An-Nahar columnist Samir Kassir’s June 2, 2005, murder in Beirut — a crime still not solved — his friends and fellow journalists have created an organization that will monitor press freedom in the region, work to improve existing laws and offer assistance to journalists and bloggers under pressure in the Levant areas of the Middle East (Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and the Palestinian areas).

SK Eyes, named for Kassir, began operations June 16 after compiling a database of violations against press freedoms and documenting relevant legal cases in the Levant. It hopes eventually to expand its reach, according to one of its founders, Elias Khoury.

The organization plans to follow the example of Reporters Without Borders, which has hosted a seminar for the incoming researchers and journalists at SK Eyes.

Nevertheless “it is fundamental that we have an Arab organization to defend the rights of the media and culture in the region and that we do not continue to count on foreign organization to defend us,” Khoury told the Arab Press Network June 27. “We must be responsible for our own causes.”

SK Eyes plans advertising campaigns, nonviolent demonstrations, petitions and other activities to spread awareness of challenges to press freedom. But its efforts also will focus on legal defenses of journalists. The organization has been compiling relevant court cases and legal documents, including potential loopholes that can be used against the freedom of expression. It plans to pressure governments to appoint lawyers to defend arrested journalists.

Swedish Press Chafes Under New Restraints

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The country that scored highest in Freedom House’s 2007 survey of political rights and civil liberties and ranked fifth among 195 countries on its 2008 Press Freedom Report has given its intelligence services broad new surveillance powers.

Under a law approved June 19, Swedish authorities now can read all crossborder e-mails and faxes and listen in on overseas telephone conversations without first obtaining a court order. Supporters claim the measures are necessary to protect Sweden’s security from those who are using communications technology to plan attacks.

But the law faces strong opposition from civil liberties advocates and Sweden’s news media and blogging community. Agneta Lindblom Hulthén, who chairs the Swedish Union of Journalists, told Sweden’s The Local that privacy safeguards were under threat. As a journalist, Hulthén expressed specific concerns over being able to protect her sources and their rights to anonymity.

In a June 18 USA Today article, Arne Konig, president of the European Federation of Journalists, said, “The tapping of journalists’ telephones compromises the watchdog role of the media and puts at risk the right to inform the public.”

Challenges to the new law are sure to follow, but in the meantime, Swedish journalists are adapting to an age in which countries struggle to reconcile heightened security concerns with long-cherished freedoms.