• By: brendan
    Date: 02 Dec 2008
    Reporters Without Borders condemns the four-year prison sentence which a special court for the clergy in the religious city of Qom imposed on online journalist and cleric Mojtaba Lotfi on 29 November for disseminating the views of Ayatollah Hussein Ali Montazeri and for “publicity against the government.” The court also sentenced Lotfi, who has been held in Qom since 8 October, to five years of banishment from the city after completing the jail term.
  • By: brendan
    Date: 02 Dec 2008
    ‘If your whole game is to increase market share,’ says Lawrence Lessig, speaking of Google, ‘it’s hard to . . . gather data in ways that don’t raise privacy concerns or in ways that might help repressive governments to block controversial content.’
  • By: brendan
    Date: 02 Dec 2008
    The Bush administration on Tuesday will try to convince a federal judge to let stand a law granting retroactive legal immunity to the nation's telecoms, which are accused of transmitting Americans' private communications to the National Security Agency without warrants.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 01 Dec 2008
    Landmark decision or just a needle prick? Danish ISP Sonofon (part of Tele2) has once again been ordered by a Danish court to block the controversial Swedish BitTorrent site The Pirate Bay. The record industry represented by The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) calls it a landmark ruling and says the decision confirms the illegality of Pirate Bay.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 01 Dec 2008
    Outgoing Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin is pushing for action in December on a plan to offer free, pornography-free wireless Internet service to all Americans, despite objections from the wireless industry and some consumer groups.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 01 Dec 2008
    THE AUSSIE government's plans to build a Great Internet Rabbit Proof Fence are floundering with even kiddie welfare groups saying it is a jolly bad idea.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 01 Dec 2008
    As mentioned in an earlier article the extreme pornography provisions will come into force on 26 January, 2009. There is not much “clear” guidance to be honest on the Ministry of Justice document only provides a concise summary of what the legislation itself says. There is some “guidance though” and here is a summary of the more interesting stuff from the Guidelines.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 26 Nov 2008
    Once a workaround is found to bypass the government’s Internet filter, it will spread like wildfire on social networking sites says Internode engineer Mark Newton
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 26 Nov 2008
    Creationist Adnan Oktar gets the internet site nacizanebilgi.com shut down on the grounds that he was insulted. He is asking for 4000 euro as an indemnity.
  • By: Jillian C. York
    Date: 25 Nov 2008
    Politicians have always been annoyed by folks who bug them to do or not do things. Somehow, they've successfully subjected such people to strict rules, never mind that the act of lobbying is nothing more than exercising First Amendment rights to "freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." And these days, few people annoy politicians more than bloggers -- which could be why online pamphleteers in Washington state may soon find themselves wading through a web of lobbying regulations.

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