All Content Related to Thailand

Thailand

miriam — Wed, 09 May 2007 21:56:26 -0400

Background

In the aftermath of a military coup that followed years of heightened fear and self-censorship, the Internet community in Thailand continues to face uncertainties created by censorship policies, antiquated laws, regulatory reform, and the privatization of state-owned telecoms. Considered by many to have inaugurated Internet filtering in Thailand, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra pursued aggressive censorship policies and, through his family-owned Shin Corporation, orchestrated a series of defamation suits against his critics.1 After Thaksin was deposed in a military coup on September 19, 2006, the interim government abrogated the 1997 Constitution, abolished the Constitutional Court, and imposed a series of restrictions on news reporting and political activity that threatened national solidarity.2

Internet in Thailand

Internet usage in Thailand began with a small base and has increased sixfold over the past five years.3 Initially, rather than encouraging growth of the Internet for all people, the government used and developed it only for state academic institutions and government agencies.4

The total number of Internet users in 2005 was estimated at 12,500,000, representing a PC Internet penetration rate of approximately 19 percent.5 However, homes and businesses in Bangkok and other major cities make up most of the penetration rate, and there is little Internet connectivity in surrounding areas.6 In 2004, about 15 percent of schools had access to the Internet.7 It is believed that more people may use the Internet as content becomes available in local languages rather than English.8 Although no significant gender divide has emerged, over half of Thai Internet users are between fifteen and twenty-four years old.9 Of this group nearly 27 percent use the Internet at cybercafés while 18 percent access from home.10 Broadband Internet access is available, but it is still undeveloped at less than 2 percent household penetration.11

Internet connectivity in Thailand is built around education/research networks, commercial networks (Internet service providers, or ISPs), and government networks.12 CAT Telecom (CAT, formerly the Communications Authority of Thailand) and the Telephone Organization of Thailand (TOT), the two big state-owned telecoms, each operate an international Internet Gateway (IIG) as well as one each of three domestic exchanges for twenty-one licensed ISPs and four noncommercial Internet hubs.13

Legal and regulatory frameworks

The Ministry of Information and Communications Technology (MICT) and its subordinate bodies, including the National Information Technology Committee (NITC), CAT, TOT, and the National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC), all regulate the Internet.14

Prior to the coup the constitution provided a nominal legal basis for censorship, although the precise authority for filtering Internet content remains unclear. Under the abrogated 1997 Constitution, Thai citizens were guaranteed the rights to express opinions; to communicate by “lawful” means; and to access information with certain limitations for state security, maintaining public order or morals, and safeguarding others’ right to privacy and reputation.15 It remains unconstitutional to criticize or level accusations against the king.16

Broad claims associating criticism of government with injury to the king, or lèse majesté, have also been used to enforce censorship. Thailand is one of the few remaining countries in the world to prosecute crimes of lèse majesté, where individuals who insult, defame, or threaten the Thai royal family can be sentenced to from three to fifteen years of imprisonment. Such allegations, in spite of King Bhumibol’s own sanction of public criticism of the Thai crown, are leveled infrequently but have targeted independent media voices17 and used as a “political tool to discredit opponents.”18 Lèse majesté, which in Thailand involves a scope of expression far broader than the actions of the king himself, has begun to form the basis for the blocking and removal of Web sites.19

In July 2003 Thailand became the first country to impose a curfew on online gaming.20 In March 2006 a regulation enforced by the Culture Ministry forbade persons under eighteen years of age from entering Internet cafés between the hours of 10pm and 2pm.21

The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) was brought into operation in late 2004 as an independent telecom regulator and given the exclusive authority to grant licenses for telecom or IT services.22 Previously, an ISP could obtain a concession contract only by giving a free equity stake of about 35 percent to CAT Telecom (formerly the Communications Authority of Thailand) in exchange for a share of the profits from the networks these companies built and paid for.23 In March 2005 the NTC announced that it would grant free licenses once permanent guidelines were in place.24

In August 2003, Thaksin’s government ordered ISPs to begin blocking a list of Web sites that were compiled by CAT and hosted on its server.25 The MICT’s Cyber Inspector team was also charged with rooting out gambling and sex sites.26 In late 2005 the government announced its plans to block over 800,000 pornographic and violent Web sites; ISPs would be ordered to take down the sites, and those that did not follow the order would have their licenses revoked.27 The prime minister also formed a nine-member Internet inspection committee, which met online each morning to compile a list of sites for ISPs to block.28 Although citizens were encouraged to submit sites for blocking through various forums,29 there has been a marked lack of transparency in the government’s decision-making process and execution of filtering. As a new constitution is slated for 2007, the legal authority for Internet filtering continues to be contested.

In the first days of martial law after the coup, military leaders issued orders intended to restore “normalcy,” demanding all political parties to stop their activities, banning new political parties, and requiring the cooperation of news media to discourage the reporting of public opinion.30 The MICT followed suit, enforcing a temporary ban on political text-messaging and phone-ins, where ISPs and authors would be held responsible for offensive messages.31

Not yet enacted at the time of the coup, a revised law laying out the terms and penalties of computer crimes was approved in principle by the newly installed National Legislative Assembly on November 15, 2006. Sponsored by the MICT and the interim military government, this bill in its current form would punish the forwarding of a pornographic e-mail with up to three years imprisonment and the posting of online activity posing a threat to “national security” as an offense under the national security law.32

ONI testing results

The stated goal of 800,000 pornographic and violent Web sites to be blocked as a result of Thaksin’s policy is only one of many reported figures of blocked sites in Thailand. For example, in 2004 there were reportedly 1,247 blocked URLs, most of which were pornographic sites, along with a few sites devoted to online gaming and one site belonging to a separatist movement.33 This proportion remained relatively intact in other accounts. Before it took down its public reports, the Police Bureau on High Tech Crime claimed to have blocked all of the over 34,000 “illicit” Web sites reported since April 2002, with Thai and foreign pornography sites at about 56 percent of the total, sites that sell of sex equipment (Thai) 12 percent, and sites with content posing a “threat to national security” at 11 percent.34 From 2002 to 2005 the MICT also blocked over 2,000 sites, reportedly mostly pornography sites.35 In addition, multiple alleged block lists containing a majority of pornography sites were “leaked.” It was common for prominent sites to be made inaccessible, only to be unblocked after a period of time.

ONI conducted testing after the coup on three major ISPs: KSC, LoxInfo, and True. Of the sites tested, only a small percentage was actually blocked. The Thai government does implement filtering and primarily blocks access to pornography, online gambling sites, and circumvention tools. Outside these categories, only a few sites were blocked by all three ISPs. Two of these sites were inaccessible and suspected to be blocked. One of these sites, the anti-coup Web site http://www.19sep.com received significant media coverage for being blocked six times over a period of three months.36 The other, the Web site of the Patani United Liberation Organisation (http://puloinfo.net) considered by the government to be a Malay Muslim separatist group, appears to be a recent incarnation of the site www.pulo.org that was also blocked and has since been taken down.

Although it has long been declared a top priority of filtering in Thailand, a minority of the Thai-related pornography sites ONI tested were actually blocked by all three ISPs. Only one pornography site (www.sex.com) on the global list was blocked by all three ISPs.

Filtering is demonstrated by redirection to an MICT blockpage. Although it has been reported that ISPs are required to block a list of banned Web sites distributed by the NITC, ONI testing found that filtering varies across ISPs. LoxInfo and True showed significant overlap in sites filtered, blocking a substantial number of additional circumvention tools and anonymous proxies (http://guardster.com; www.stayinvisible.com), pornography, and gaming sites. A few sites promoting human rights, such as the Patani Malay Human Rights Organisation (www.pmhro.org), were also blocked by both ISPs.

Only KSC appeared to address the issue of lèse majesté, blocking a number of pages on amazon.com and other commerce sites featuring biographies of the king. These present an example of URL filtering in Thailand, as various amazon.com URLs were blocked but the domain (www.amazon.com) remained available on all ISPs tested.

Conclusion

The current official approach toward filtering is in flux, especially in the face of questions about the legal authority and procedures for censorship after the abolishment of the 1997 Constitution. However, evidence from ONI testing suggests that targets for blocking have remained consistent, with a strong focus on pornography and lesser priorities made of gaming and circumvention tools. Only a small number of sites with sensitive political content, particularly about the Thai monarchy and insurgents in the south, continue to be inaccessible. It remains to be seen whether the harsh legacy of censorship of all media created by the former prime minister’s government will be carried forward in post-coup Thailand.

NOTES

1. For example, the Shin Corporation sought four hundred million baht (USD10 million) in defamation suits from the Thai Post newspaper and the first defendant, Supinya Klangnarong, a media freedom activist with the NGO Campaign for Popular Media Reform. See also Reporters Without Borders, Thailand:Annual Report 2006, http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=17364.
2. Council for Democratic Reform, Announcement No. 3, September 19, 2006.
3. Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd., Thailand-Internet, 2006, p. 1.
4. Steven Huter, Sirin Palasri, and Zita Wenzel, The History of the Internet in Thailand. Network Startup Resource Center: University of Oregon Books, http://www.nsrc.org/case-studies/thailand/english/conclusion.html.
5. Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd., Thailand-Internet, 2006, p. 1.
6. National Statistical Office: Thailand, 2005 Information and Communication Technology Survey, http://web.nso.go.th/eng/en/stat/ict/ict05_rep.pdf.
7. National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC), Thailand MICT Indicators 2005, February 2005, pp. 28, 41, http://iir.ngi.nectec.or.th/download/indicator2005.pdf.
8. Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd., Thailand-Internet, 2006, p. 1.
9. National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC), Thailand MICT Indicators 2005, February 2005, http://iir.ngi.nectec.or.th/download/indicator2005.pdf.
10. Ibid.
11. Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd., Telecommunication Sector Snapshot: Thailand, 2006.
12. National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC), Internet Network Infrastructure:Thailand’s Perspective, January 10, 2002, http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/APCITY/UNPAN012808....
13. Internet Connectivity in Thailand, December 2006, http://iir.ngi.nectec.or.th/internet/map/current.html.
14. Reporters Without Borders, Internet Under Surveillance 2004: Thailand, http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=10777.
15. Articles 37, 39, 58, 59. See Article 19, Freedom of Expression and the Media in Thailand, December 2005, p. 38.
16. Article 8, Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand, adopted October 11, 1997; Article 1, Constitution of the Kingdom of Thailand (Interim Edition), adopted October 1, 2006.
17. Asia Human Rights Commission, Update on Urgent Appeal, April 10, 2006, http://www.ahrchk.net/ua/mainfile.php/2006/1651/.
18. Article 19, Freedom of Expression and the Media in Thailand, December 2005, p. 75.
19. For example, the Midnight University Web site and forum (www.midnightuniv.org) was blocked in July 2006 on claims of lèse majesté, although it was accessible at time of testing. See Bangkok Post, “Web board banned, claim of lese majesty,” July 28, 2006, reprinted at http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/06thailandcoup/article.asp?parentid=49971. The site for discussing political and social issues was blocked by the MMICT on September 29, 2006, the day after scholars at Chiang Mai University affiliated with the Web site tore up mock copies of the interim military government’s constitution. Bangkok Post, “Thai university website closed after protest over interim charter,” October 1, 2006, reprinted at http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article-southeastasia.asp?parentid=54251.
20. Phermsak Lilakul, “Ragnarok curfew starts tonight,” The Nation, July 17, 2003.
21. Anchalee Kongrut, “16-hour Internet cafe curfew for under-18s,” Bangkok Post, April 25, 2006.
22. Telecommunications, IT and E-Commerce, http://bia.co.th/027.html.
23. Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd., Thailand-Internet, 2006, p. 5.
24. Ibid.
25. Bangkok Post, “Govt forces ISPs to block `inappropriate' web sites,” September 7, 2003.
26. Bangkok Post, “PM wants tighter curbs on internet,” December 18, 2003.
27. Agence France-Presse, “Thailand to block over 800,000 sites,” November 28, 2005.
28. Ibid.
29. See, for example, Thaisnews, “New program will be launched on Radio Thailand,” January 31, 2006, http://www.thaisnews.com/news_detail.php?newsid=160479.
30. Announcement by the Council for Democratic Reform No. 10: Request for Cooperation in News Reporting, September 20, 2006; Announcement by the Council for Democratic Reform No. 15: Ban on Meetings and other Political Activities by Political Parties, September 21, 2006, http://www.mMICT.go.th/cdrc/read_all.asp?cid=1 ; Bangkok Post, “Coup leaders authorise press censorship,” September 20, 2006.
31. Financial Times, Thai Press Reports, “MICT imposes temporary ban on political text-messaging and phone-in,” September 26, 2006.
32. Thai Press Reports, “National Legislative Assembly approves computer crime bill in principle,” November 20, 2006.
33. Miles Ignotus, “Censoring the Web,” Bangkok Post, February 15, 2004.
34. Bangkok Post, “Censors busy on the Internet,” November 24, 2006, http://cyber.police.go.th/reporting/report/sum.php (page no longer available).
35. Kavi Chongkittavorn, “Stop messing with Internet access and free debate,” The Nation, November 20, 2006.
36. The Nation, “Freedom of speech: Anti-coup website blocked again without notification,” December 30, 2006, http://nationmultimedia.com/2006/12/30/politics/politics_30022916.php.

ONI Releases Reports on Filtering in Asia, China

Jillian C. York — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:42:14 -0400

New research from the OpenNet Initiative reveals accelerating restrictions on Internet content as Asian governments shift to next generation controls. These new techniques go beyond blocking access to websites and are more informal and fluid, implemented at edges of the network, and are often backed up by increasingly restrictive and broadly interpreted laws.

The reports also point to an emerging inclination for states to actively engage in cyberspace as a way to achieve the same effects of information controls:

“Since 2006, many Asian governments have quickly realized the potential benefits of exploiting opportunities for conducting propaganda or public relations strategies over the Internet, even while cracking down on independent and critical voices thriving in these online spaces– an example of the evolution towards next generation controls,” said Ron Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto and one of four principal investigators at the ONI.

China continues to stand out amongst its neighbors due to its devotion of significant resources to consistently pursue both aggressive technical measures to pervasively filter information, as well as a regulatory regime aimed at perfecting these next-generation controls against private companies and other non-state actors.

These controls were evidenced recently in ONI’s analysis of China’s latest attempt at controlling the flow of information, Green Dam Youth Escort filtering software mandated for pre-installation on PCs sold in China starting July 1. “However, even China’s example demonstrates that restrictions on information are far from uniformly effective, and will meet resistance and be contested by the very groups they are intended to silence,” said Rafal Rohozinski, CEO of the SecDev Group and co-founder and principal investigator of ONI and ONI Asia.

“The Internet has been shown to be an especially effective tool for journalists, civil society activists and opposition leaders in Asia during elections or other national political crises,” said Al Alegre, regional coordinator for ONI Asia, which has developed into a regionally focused ONI network.

The reports for Asia, as well as Burma, China, Pakistan, and South Korea will be featured in a forthcoming MIT Press volume, Access Controlled: The Shaping of Rights, Rule, and Power in Cyberspace, to be published by MIT Press (2010). Access Controlled will include a series of analytical chapters and regional overviews that contribute to the developing discourse around global Internet regulation and censorship raised in the first ONI volume Access Denied: The Practice and Policy of Global Internet Filtering, (Cambridge: MIT Press) 2008.

The OpenNet Initiative is the global leader in the study of Internet censorship and a collaborative partnership of three leading academic institutions: the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto; the SecDev Group (formerly the Advanced Network Research Group at the Cambridge Security Programme, Cambridge University); and the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, Harvard University. The ONI’s principal investigators are Ronald J. Deibert
Director, The Citizen Lab, Munk Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto; Rafal Rohozinski, Former Director, Advanced Network Research Group, Cambridge Security Programme, University of Cambridge; and John Palfrey and Jonathan Zittrain of Harvard University.

ONI Asia is a collaborative research, advocacy, and networking project whose aim is to foster the respect for human rights online, and inform local, regional and global public policy. ONI Asia is funded by the International Development Research Council (IDRC), Canada.

View the reports on Asia and China here:

Asia Regional Overview
Internet Filtering in China

Over 1,203 Sites Blocked in Thailand

Jillian C. York — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 13:05:39 -0500

Over the weekend, it was reported by WikiLeaks that the secret censorship lists of Thailand's Ministroy of Information and Communication Technology (MICT) had been obtained by advisory board member CJ Hinke, who is the director of Freedom Against Censorship Thailand.

Wikileaks reports that the 1,203 newly blocked sites are located in over 20 different countries including Canada, France, and Australia, and that each blocked site is internally noted as being blocked due to "lèse majesté," or criticism of the King. The group states that it is apparent that many of the sites were not examined closely, however, and appear not to violate that particular law at all.

Of the blocked sites, over 860 are YouTube videos, and 200 sites mirroring those videos are being filtered as well. Wikileaks states that "Curiously, Hillary Clinton's campaign videos, and 24 Charlie Chaplin videos are also on the censorship lists."

Although the OpenNet Initiative has not yet confirmed the reports, Thailand has been found to selectively filter political sites in the past. ONI's full report on Thailand can be found here.

Wikileaks calls for transparency from the MICT, saying: "Typically, web censorship in Thailand is conducted in secret. We think there is a right to know inherent in a free society. We call for transparency and accountability in government and freedom of expression, freedom of communication and freedom of association as fundamental human rights."

YouTube and the rise of geolocational filtering

Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:39:48 -0400

YouTomb, a project of the MIT Free Culture group that studies takedown notices by the video-sharing website YouTube, has identified a mechanism used by Google to restrict video content in specific countries. This appears to be the method YouTube is using to filter videos on behalf of governments and private actors that request it.

A growing number of countries have instituted mostly short-lived blocks against YouTube for containing culturally or politically sensitive content, including Brazil, China, Morocco, Syria, Thailand and Turkey. On February 22, 2008, Pakistani ISPs were ordered to partially block YouTube reportedly in reaction to a video making fun of the Prophet Muhammad, and ended up disrupting access to the entire site for users around the world for up to a few hours. In some cases, YouTube has blocked the identified offending video(s) in that country in order to have the block lifted.

In the course of investigating the opaque process of take downs, the team noticed an unusual flag in the XML data attached to official video clips uploaded by the National Basketball Association (NBA). They noted that some of the NBA videos have flags [media :restriction type="country" relationship="deny">CN] indicating that they are coded to be restricted from viewing in China. Further investigation showed that Yao Ming-related videos also carry the restriction flag. However, the mechanism for flagging was not described in the API documentation from Google and a quick look into the upload panel of a standard Youtube account did not show a way for users to code this flag. The team also checked a director level account and still could not find a way to create these restrictions. At this point, the Youtomb team hypothesized that content could be easily censored using this mechanism despite lack of concrete evidence of the practice, and began searching specific keywords and videos provided by the ONI team.

In April 2007, the Thai government blocked YouTube after it initially refused to comply with demands to remove a video intended to offend King Bhumibol Adulyadej. In Thailand, the crime of lese majeste—defaming, insulting or threatening the royal family--is punishable by up to 15 years imprisonment. In August, the Thai Ministry of Information Communications and Technology (MICT) agreed to lift the ban after YouTube agreed to prevent some of these lese majeste videos from being accessed through Thai ISPs.

Youtomb has confirmed that this policy persists in Thailand. In accessing these videos for the purpose of documenting restrictions, ONI and Youtomb found that the majority, but not all, of the videos leveling insult at the King tested by ONI and Youtomb carry the restriction flag. When trying to access these clips, users of the Thai ISP CAT see a pink band across the top of the YouTube page which states, "This video is not available in your country."

Some of the videos that appear to intentionally invoke lese majeste are included below, with almost identical content but varying in popularity, with numbers of views ranging from a few thousands to tens of thousands. Many of these appear to be uploaded by users opposed to the criminalization of lese majeste in Thailand. They all carry the restriction flag.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70m1ncXQjXA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1USDXkaJFM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5SQlVK9yL4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sPvywhqXQQ

Not the usual suspects—yet

After discovering that standard NBA highlight material contained a flag restricting viewing in China, the team attempted to scan for videos known to be sensitive to the Chinese government, using keywords such as "falun gong", "tiananmen", "tank man", "mao", and “cultural revolution.” Searches for keywords like "Mao" yielded a restricted video featuring the figure skater Mao Asado, produced by CBC. The video carries the restriction flag for a hodgepodge of countries: Guadeloupe, French Guyana, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, French Southern Territories, French Polynesia, Germany, Poland, Réunion, Mayotte, France, and Martinique. Other videos about Mao Asada are not restricted anywhere. A handful of other Yao Ming related videos were also found, restricted only in China. For China, none of the videos Youtomb selected on the basis of sensitive keywords carried the flag. This is a demonstration of how YouTube can accommodate both the requests of governments as well as private interests in applying this tool to restrict content to entire countries of users.

In Turkey, YouTube has been blocked a number of times in the past year for content the government considered offensive to founding father Kamal Ataturk and the Turkish people. However, the YouTomb team found no restriction tag for Turkey in reviewing a selection of videos laying insult to Ataturk.

The YouTomb team has started scanning Geert Wilders-related videos for evidence of media restrictions or takedown attempts in Pakistan. A watchlist will be set up to monitor the scope of content to which these flags are applied to restrict access. Potential new restrictions could spring from proposed legislation in Thailand, which would extend lese majeste protection to certain relatives of the monarch and privy council members, or videos critical of the Koran or Musharraf in Pakistan.

Negotiating Expression

The fact that YouTube is selectively filtering videos by location is not new; many of these examples have been reported widely in the press. The YouTomb investigations seem to have uncovered the technical mechanism that YouTube uses to implement this selective filtering, one that can be easily scaled up to block many more videos than are currently filtered, or in many more countries. YouTube is one of the most important global sites that define the emergence of Web 2.0, facilitating the proliferation of user-generated videos in the read/write culture that has greatly increased the ability and impact of participatory media and culture. Given the size and influence of YouTube, the policies adopted by Google and YouTube hold great importance for free expression. They are also inconsistent: Google Video allows users themselves to choose country restrictions for their videos, a functionality that is not available on the YouTube upload panel.

However, Google and YouTube seem to be falling into line with the realities of an increasingly fractured and bordered Internet. Google has been at the center of debates over the role of private companies in promoting and restricting freedom of expression. While Google has publicly declared its commitment to promoting freedom of expression and information, they have also been convinced to restrict search results or users in a number of countries. It cites the imperative of obeying local law and/or culture in various jurisdictions as the rationale for blocking neo-Nazi content in Germany and its search services to minors in South Korea, but this becomes problematic in countries with politically repressive governments. For services such as Google.cn where search results are the most restricted, Google’s primary justification is that on balance, implementing such restrictions actually expands the overall scope of information and expression.

These agreements between YouTube and governments raise some troubling questions. Do the disclosures made by YouTube and Google [“This video is not available in your country" and “A portion of these search results cannot be displayed in accordance with local laws and regulations”] provide sufficient transparency to users on the processes, negotiations and concessions underlying the censorship? For example, Thailand became one of the only countries in Asia to require court authorization for filtering when King Bhumibol signed the Act on Computer Crime into law on June 10, 2007. Yet neither the Thai government nor YouTube seem to be interested in pursuing formal legal channels to implement video-specific filtering. In April 2007, YouTube’s head of communications was quoted in a Wall Street Journal editorial as saying: “We will not take down videos that do not violate our policies, and will not assist in implementing censorship, we have offered to educate the Thai ministry about YouTube and how it works." Almost a year later, YouTube has made de facto policy out of hewing to the Thai government’s demands based on its domestic law.

In the case of Thailand, filtering has not been implemented by a government within its borders, but by a private actor using its own resources. The Thai government used the threat and actual execution of blocking as a bargaining chip to achieve more selective local filtering. YouTube’s geolocational filtering sidesteps legally mandated procedures and heads into a murky zone of cooperation between government and private actors in policing the scope of expression, a line that is becoming less and less clear.

Many of these decisions are being driven by technological capacity. ISPs in many of the countries intent on blocking YouTube videos do not have the capability to block individual videos. This leaves them with few choices: do nothing, block the entire YouTube site, or lean on Google to selectively block videos for them. YouTube’s country-specific tagging system suggests that it is prepared to carry this out at a broad scale, at least technologically. It is not difficult to imagine a growing number of countries lining up to request special help from YouTube to block specific videos, perhaps even providing them a regularly updated list. China is a notable exception in that it has the capacity to block individual YouTube videos, and YouTomb has not yet discovered restriction flags on videos containing content the government considers sensitive. However, this raises the question of whether and to what extent YouTube may decide to implement a voluntary filtering strategy for China, such as Google and Yahoo! search engines and Microsoft’s MSN Spaces.

YouTomb methodology

Youtube can be accessed through the Google gData API that is publicly documented and does not require any keys. This type of access allows the Youtomb team to "scan" through thousands of videos at a time. Certain URLs allow for the scanning of particular meta properties such as popularity. These URLs provide a continually updated feed of videos that have been viewed by the most viewers at the time of the request. This is the default feed that Youtomb spends its time parsing and evaluating for take down notices. The resulting XML document generally contains multiple videos. The method of enumerating which countries are currently restricted from playback is also defined in the API documentation. The documentation lists a parameter to define the IP address where a video will ultimately be displayed. Restrictions are based on the ISO 3166 2-letter country code.

Similarly, another URL allows for topic- or keyword-based scanning. The API describes a different URL for this type of scanning returns results based on this, not popularity (politically sensitive videos may not be viewed as widely as the mainstream videos that dominate Youtube).

Finally, every video has an identifier which can be used to retrieve information about specific videos. This is the most powerful tool used by the Youtomb team for manual analysis of videos on its "watchlist". Known offensive videos, such as the "Geert Wilders" videos, can be targeted and monitored over time for the inclusion of a media restriction flag. This process led to the confirmation of Youtube's lese majeste filtering from Thai viewers. The automation of this process is under construction, and will be added to the YouTomb site soon.

Thailand passes new cybercrimes law

Thu, 10 May 2007 15:52:06 -0400

Today the Bangkok Post reported that the Thai National Legislative Assembly (NLA) approved the Cyber Crimes Bill in a nearly unanimous vote. Nearly a year has passed since the military coup overthrowing former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and the current NLA is made up of legislators appointed by the new government.

Since the coup, Thai citizens no longer have a constitution that guarantees or upholds their fundamental rights, and many provisions of this new law add to the uncertainty. ONI conducted a quick analysis based on a translated draft version of the bill from last fall provided by the Freedom against Censorship in Thailand coalition.

Of particular importance to users, accessing certain types of content has been brought into the broad scope of cybercrimes. In addition to facing prison terms for possessing child pornography, an individual is now prohibited from accessing a computer system to acquire data of a pornographic nature, data that is likely to harm national security or cause public panic, or data relating to a criminal offense against the security of the Kingdom (Article 13). This leaves anyone who attempts to access content filtered by the government without public consultation or stated legal authority vulnerable to criminal prosecution. ONI testing has found that pornography, sites relating to separatist conflict and domestic security, and content relating to lese majeste (hence the blocking of YouTube) are filtered in Thailand.

In the translated draft bill, the definition of "service provider" is broad and inclusive. A Thai government official stated that the definition covered a wide range of players, including cybercafes. From a reading of Article 3, service provider also appears to include any individual or entity that provides a service enabling any mutual communication via a computer system, which could bring e-mail providers and others under the scope of the law.

A range of service providers (to be identified later by a Minister) are required to store traffic data for a minimum of 30 days (Article 24), and competent officials have the right to demand user-related and user-identifying information from anyone (Article 16). The law was amended to require officials to secure court authorization in order to obtain this data.

AFP: Thai group petitions for end to Internet censorship

nart — Wed, 15 Nov 2006 18:17:53 -0500

The recently founded group Freedom Against Censorship Thailand (FACT) has petitioned the Thai Human Rights Commission for an end to Internet censorship.

Thai Rak Thai Party asks supporters to criticize government on website

nart — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 12:33:38 -0500

After having its website (www.thairakthai.or.th) blocked and restored in the wake of the Thai coup, the ousted Thai Rak Thai Party is creating a blog on the site and calling on its supporters to "air their frustrations about the current government and express political opinions."

Thailand: Thai Rak Thai Party Website Restored

nart — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 15:51:26 -0400

After a day of inaccessibility on Oct. 2, the website of the Thai Rak Thai party (www.thairakthai.or.th) was back online on Oct. 3. According to Bangkok's The Nation, the restored website "plays up the resignation letter of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra as party leader." However, the website www.thaksin.com, "which Thaksin used to receive emails and comments from his supporters and to promote himself and his party's policies" remains unavailable.

Thailand: Midnight University Website Shut Down in Wake of Protest

nart — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 17:42:41 -0400

As reported by the Bangkok newspaper The Nation, the online academic forum Midnight University (www.midnightuniv.org) was shut down by Thailand's Information and Communications Technology Ministry on September 29, one day after five Chiang Mai University scholars tore up an imitation interim constitution and criticized the Council for Democratic Reform (CDR) for drafting the provisional charter without public participation.

Thailand Imposes Media and Internet Speech Restrictions in Wake of Coup

nart — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 20:14:30 -0400

The military junta that deposed controversial Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra earlier this week has revoked all laws in the country and issued its own vague media restrictions requiring all media outlets to self-censor. Media are required to report only "positive" news and to refrain from reporting information that would "disturb the peace"--that is, news that portrays Thaksin or his allies in a positive light, or criticizes the junta, is illegal. "We want to give the media full freedom, but at this point as the situation is not normal yet, we have to seek media cooperation,'' Surasant Kongsiri, the junta's assistant spokesman said. "At this stage we are receiving very good cooperation from all. Please write positively.'' On September 19, the military leaders interrupted television and radio broadcasts for several hours, and there were reports of soldiers "guarding" newsrooms.

Websites in Thailand are also under scrutiny, with at least one local English-language blog--19Sep--ordered to shut down for running content contrary to the new government guidelines for media and speech. Attempting to access the blog now leads to an error page. The Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA) is reporting on its blog that hundreds of community radio stations have been shut down and self-censorship is increasing across the board as the media situation in Thailand "deteriorates".