Venezuela: Concerns About Controls on the Internet

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    Date: 
    23 March 2010

    Debate is heating up in Venezuela after a series of decrees and statements from President Hugo Chávez, who questioned how the Internet is being used in the country. Many are interpreting these statements and policy proposals by the Assembly that there is the desire by the government to control the Internet in Venezuela.

    After almost a year of discussion regarding the decree that questioned the Internet as a priority, these concerns are appearing once again online. Much of the government's concerns were demonstrated when a bit of news was falsely declared in the forums of the site Noticiero Digital, an online Venezuelan newspaper that Diosdado Cabello, the Minister of Public Works and Housing had died. The false information remained published for two days, and was picked up and republished on other blogs. It was two days until the site's administrators took the information down and made the correction.