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Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Internet censorship listed: how does each country compare?


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Censorship of internet content can take many forms and ranges from governments blocking the dissemination of political opinion to blacklisting pornographic and pirate websites.
The OpenNet Initiative is a collaboration between three groups – the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto's Munk school of global affairsHarvard University's Berkman centre for internet & society and the SecDev Group in Ottawa – that investigates internet filtering around the world.
ONI principal investigator and Citizen Lab director Ronald Deibert says:
Originally and probably still to a large extent, pornography is both the most widely targeted content and also the one that's justified the most by countries. Most countries, if they're going to engage in internet censorship, start by talking about a broad category of inappropriate content. But what we've found over the last decade is the spectrum of content that's targeted for filtering has grown to include political content and security-related content, especially in authoritarian regimes. The scope and scale of content targeted for filtering has grown.
For each country, the ONI looks at the following four categories of filtering and gives each a rank ranging from "No evidence of filtering" to "Pervasive filtering":
• Political – content opposing the current government or its policies; can also relate to human rights, freedom of expression, minority rights or religious movements
• Social – content that might be perceived as offensive by the general population such as sexuality, gambling, illegal drugs, etc 
• Conflict/security – Content related to armed conflicts, border disputes, militant groups and separatist movements
• Internet tools – Tools enabling users to communicate with others, circumvent filtering or that otherwise provide a service. Each country is then classified in terms of consistency – how consistently these topics are filtered across internet service providers – and transparency – how visible the process is by which sites are blocked and whether users are able to view what's on the blacklist.
According to the ONI data, Iran was the worst ranked, with "pervasive" filtering in the political, social and internet tools categories and "substantial" for conflict/security filtering. Tested in 2011, Iran's filtering was rated as being "highly" consistent and had "medium" transparency. Even the country's president isn't immune to the blacklist – it was reported in February this year that censors had blocked access to several news sites supporting Ahmadinejad ahead of the parliamentary elections in March. Worse yet, Iran has proposed a national internet, which would both increase the government's grip over individual connections but also restrict foreign users from accessing Iranian websites. Additionally, individuals are also required to provide personal details to even use a cybercafe.
After Iran was China, which had "pervasive" political and conflict/security filtering, along with "substantial" internet tools and social filtering. In addition to highly consistent filtering, China also had a lower transparency score than Iran. On April 12, Chinese users were cut off from all foreign websites, possibly due to a reconfiguration of the so-called "great firewall."
Meanwhile, authorities have shut down 42 websites since March this year. "The market for filtering technologies has grown worldwide; what started out as a market primarily oriented to corporate environments in the west has now become a major growing business for government," said Deibert.
Our research identified many corporations – mostly Silicon Valley corporations – that have provided products and services to regimes that have violated human rights. The market for these types of technologies that are used to implement control is growing more sophisticated
However, Deibert feels governments are moving away from widespread blacklists of websites to filter and towards what the ONI calls "next-generation filtering," which includes targeted surveillance and "just in time" filtering, or temporarily filtering content only when it's valuable – for instance, during an election. "We're seeing a trend away from traditional internet censorship and towards next-generation controls," he said. "The future is not in the great firewall but in the way countries like Iran have come to filter content."
Do you agree with the ONI assessment? Let us know in the comment field below. You can also download the data too direct from the ONI – what can you do with it? And what would you want to see it compared with?

Data summary

ONI ranking of each country for internet censorship

Click heading to sort table. Download this data
Country
Political filtering
Social filtering
Internet tools filtering
Conflict/security filtering
United Arab Emiratessubstantialpervasivepervasiveselective
Afghanistanno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Armeniasubstantialselectiveselectiveselective
Australiano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Azerbaijanselectiveselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Bangladeshno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Bahrainpervasivepervasivesubstantialselective
Belarusselectiveselectiveselectiveselective
Canadano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Chinapervasivesubstantialsubstantialpervasive
Colombiano evidenceselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Germanyno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Denmarkno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Algeriano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Egyptno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Ethiopiasubstantialselectiveselectiveselective
Finlandno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Franceno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
United Kingdomno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Georgiaselectiveno evidenceno evidenceselective
Guatemalano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Croatiano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Hungaryno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Indonesiaselectivesubstantialselectiveno evidence
Israelno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Indiaselectiveselectiveselectiveselective
Iraqno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Iranpervasivepervasivepervasivesubstantial
Italyno evidenceselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Jordanselectiveno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Kyrgyzstanselectiveselectiveno evidenceno evidence
South Koreano evidenceselectiveno evidencepervasive
Kuwaitselectivepervasivepervasiveselective
Kazakhstanselectiveselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Laosno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Lebanonno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Sri Lankano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Latviano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Libyaselectiveno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Moroccono evidenceselectiveselectiveselective
Moldovaselectiveno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Burma (Myanmar)pervasivesubstantialsubstantialsubstantial
Mauritaniaselectiveno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Mexicono evidenceno evidenceno evidenceselective
Malaysiano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Nigeriano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Norwayno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Nepalno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Omanselectivepervasivesubstantialno evidence
Peruno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Philippinesno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Pakistanselectiveselectiveselectivesubstantial
Gaza and the West Bankno evidencesubstantialno evidenceno evidence
Qatarselectivepervasivepervasiveselective
Romaniano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Russiaselectiveselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Saudi Arabiasubstantialpervasivepervasiveselective
Sudanselectivesubstantialsubstantialno evidence
Swedenno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Singaporeno evidenceselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Syriapervasiveselectivepervasiveselective
Thailandselectiveselectiveselectiveno evidence
Tajikistanselectiveno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Turkmenistanpervasiveselectiveselectiveselective
Tunisiano evidenceselectiveselectiveno evidence
Turkeyselectiveselectiveselectiveno evidence
Ukraineno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Ugandano evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
United Statesno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence
Uzbekistanpervasiveselectiveselectiveselective
Venezuelano evidenceselectiveno evidenceno evidence
Vietnampervasiveselectivesubstantialselective
Yemensubstantialpervasivepervasiveselective
Zimbabweno evidenceno evidenceno evidenceno evidence

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