Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, The Representative on Freedom of the Media (November 2010): Preliminary Report: Study of legal provisions and practices related to freedom of expression, the free flow of information and media pluralism on the Internet in the OSCE participating States.

This preliminary report has been commissioned by the Office of the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media and prepared by Dr. Yaman Akdeniz, Associate Professor of Law, Faculty of Law, Istanbul Bilgi University, Turkey.

It presents the first stage of research into the first comprehensive study of legal provisions and practices related to freedom of expression, the free flow of information and media pluralism on the Internet in the OSCE participating States. This preliminary report was prepared in view of the OSCE review conference and OSCE Astana Summit 2010. The final study is expected to be concluded in January 2011 and will be published in both, English and Russian language.

Executive Summary
Today, many OSCE participating States are reacting to the availability and dissemination of certain types of (illegal or unwanted) content through the Internet by trying to regulate or control its dissemination. There is particularly major concern about the availability of terrorist propaganda, racist content, sexually explicit content including child pornography, as well as content defined as hate speech on the Internet.

This OSCE-wide Internet content regulation study involves a comprehensive overview of existing international legal provisions and standards relating to media freedom and freedom of expression on the Internet, and the study will assess whether and how these are incorporated into national legislation, and applied by the OSCE participating States.

Furthermore, the final study will assess the compliance of applicable national Internet legislation and practices with existing OSCE media freedom commitments, Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (where applicable) and other relevant international standards (UN, CoE, etc.). For this purpose the study will involve the compilation of a comprehensive OSCE-wide legal matrix of all legal provisions related to freedom of the media, the free flow of information and media pluralism on the Internet. A survey questionnaire was prepared during the summer of 2010 and distributed to all OSCE participating States on 23 September 2010. Responses to the questionnaire were expected by 15 November, 2010. Depending on timely submissions, the study is expected to be concluded in January 2011.

This preliminary report aims to lay out the first findings of the OSCE Internet Regulation Study based 1) on the review and presentation of major international legal provisions related to the subject; 2) on the examination and assessment of the efficiency, the advantages and disadvantages of various international and national content regulation measures – particularly vis-à-vis fundamental rights of free expression and media freedom; and 3) by taking into account international as well as national academic and policy discussions on the matter. This report also includes preliminary conclusions which will be further developed based on the responses to be received from the OSCE participating States to the questionnaire.

This report argues that access-blocking measures show their inadequacy as an efficient and proportionate method to combat illegal Internet content, and raises concern about the possibility of using blocking measures or upstream filtering tools at state level to silence politically motivated speech on the Internet. The report shows that international organizations such as the Council of Europe and the European Union have recognized the inefficiency of blocking for fighting serious crimes. Furthermore, the report warns that blocking access to any Web 2.0 based applications and services such as YouTube, WordPress, Facebook, and Twitter, to mention a few, may have extreme side effects and strong implications on political expression.

Regarding the protection of children from accessing online content deemed to be harmful, the report states that participating States should encourage the application of end-user based filtering software on home computers, and in schools if their use is deemed necessary. However, the deployment of state level upstream filtering systems should be avoided at all costs.

In concluding, this preliminary report calls for the OSCE participating States to respect OSCE commitments and other international human rights principles when developing their Internet content related policies and regulations. The states’ response should be proportional, correspond to a “pressing social need”, and be in line with the requirements of democracy with regards to content based restrictions. Internet access should be regarded as a fundamental human right, and network neutrality should not only be respected but upheld by the OSCE participating States.

The Preliminary Report is available as a PDF file.

Free speech: Turkey versus Google | Index on Censorship

16 Jun 2010

Turkey’s Internet censorship hit the news this week when the country’s own president raised his objections to the policy on Twitter. Yaman Akdeniz explains the state’s recent struggles with Google and YouTube

Access to YouTube has been blocked from Turkey since a May 2008 order by an Ankara court. The order was issued because of 10 video clips involving defamatory statements and images about the founder of the Turkish Republic Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. These clips were deemed illegal under Law No. 5816 — ‘Crimes Against Atatürk’. Access to such content can be blocked under Law No 5651 — ‘Regulation of Publications on the Internet and Suppression of Crimes Committed by Means of Such Publication’ — which came into force in November 2007.

Since then access to a considerable number of websites has been blocked in Turkey. In January 2010, a report by the OSCE on Turkey and Internet Censorship documented that 3,700 Internet websites are blocked. Miklos Haraszti, the then OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, asked the Turkish authorities to bring Turkey’s Internet law in line with OSCE commitments and other international standards on freedom of expression. Haraszti argued that the law, by blocking access to entire websites, paralysed access to numerous modern file sharing and social networks. The current number of blocked websites is estimated to be around 5,000.

In June 2010, the situation went from bad to worse as the Telecommunications Communication Presidency (TIB) asked Turkish Internet Service Providers to block access to certain IP addresses associated with YouTube. The ISPs then started warning their users that as a result of TIB’s request to block access to certain IP addresses certain Google services may also be affected. In fact considerable number of Google related services (including popular services such as Analytics, Translate, Docs, Books, Map, and Earth) have been affected from Turkey since the 4 June.
Google services are not completely blocked, but users are reporting that they either cannot access them at all or that access is painfully slow. My own tests from two different ISPs confirmed this. Under heavy criticism, TIB claimed through a press release issued on 4 June that it was updating IP addresses associated with the YouTube blocking order, and it was Google’s fault that they were using the same IP addresses for YouTube as well as for the Google-related services.

As there is no specific court issued blocking order or an administrative blocking order associated with Google related services we [the author and Dr Kerem Altıparmak, Assistant Professor at the Ankara University Faculty of Political Sciences] registered an appeal with TIB. We argued that the administrative body’s action was unlawful, and disproportionate as access to YouTube was already blocked from Turkey. Therefore, a more restrictive measure which also affects other Google services is unnecessary. At the same time, an administrative court action was also launched by an Internet related civil society group, claiming TIB’s action to be unlawful.

Although initially the IP blocking action looked like a side effect of the Turkish authorities desire to make it even more difficult to access YouTube, the real reason behind the blocking action turned to be a tax issue. The Transportation Minister who is also responsible for the state’s Internet policy claimed that Google owns the government £GBP 13m in tax levy, and called on Google to register as a taxpayer in the country to ‘help accelerate’ the lifting of a ban on YouTube and Google services. However, tax evasion is not included as one of the catalogue crimes under Law No. 5651 as a legal justification for blocking access to websites from Turkey!

Whether we like it or not, and without forgetting about privacy and data protection related problems associated with Google across Europe with its Street View service and other privacy issues, Google remains a vital source of information. Its services have a major public benefit, not only for Internet users but also for thousands of companies who use its services for business purposes. Therefore, this latest disproportionate state action can only be described as censorship, and remains unacceptable in a democratic society.

Dr Yaman Akdeniz is Associate Professor, Human Rights Law Research Center, Faculty of Law, Istanbul Bilgi University, and Director of Cyber-Rights.Org

Turks infuriated over ban on Google sites (SETimes.com)

Turkish activists have initiated a legal challenge against the government’s controversial move to block Google services.

By A Simsek for Southeast European Times — 15/06/10

Professor Yaman Akdeniz. [Photo by A.Simsek/SETimes]

A move by the Turkish government to block Google services has left millions of internet users frustrated and put the country’s internet legislation under scrutiny.

As part of an ongoing ban on YouTube, the government earlier this month imposed a blanket restriction on the IP addresses the video-sharing site uses. YouTube, however, is owned by Google Inc., and the search giant uses various dynamic IPs.

As a result, a number of different services — including Google Analytics, Docs, Translate and Books — are now blocked in Turkey.

Internet users and activists there are infuriated. An ongoing campaign against internet censorship drew thousands of supporters, including representatives of NGOs and internet sites.

Two cyber rights activists, Associate Professor Yaman Akdeniz, a member of the Bilgi University Faculty of Law, and Assistant Professor Kerem Altiparmak, a member of the Ankara University Faculty of Political Science, have asked the European Court of Human Rights to revoke the controversial ban.

‘This blanket IP ban and restrictions on accessing Google services is a violation of basic freedoms — freedom of communication and the right to information — which are also guaranteed in the Turkish Constitution,’ Akdeniz told SETimes. The YouTube ban dates back to 2008, when an Ankara court ruled that various videos posted on the site are an insult to Turkey’s founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

At that time, only three IP numbers were associated with YouTube and only these were blocked. Although the ten insulting videos are inaccessible from Turkey, a total blockage of YouTube continues.

‘The difficulties in accessing some Google services in Turkey appears to be linked to the ongoing ban on You Tube. We are working to get our services back up as soon as possible,’ Google spokesman Jordan Newman told SETimes.

Under heavy criticism, the government blamed Google Inc. for changing its configurations, mixing YouTube’s IP numbers with Google sites.

The government is also demanding that the internet giant register in Turkey, operate under Turkish law and pay taxes within the country. The finance ministry seeks taxes to the tune of 15.1m euros.

‘Google should obey the rules of Turkey,’ Transport and Communications Minister Binali Yildirim said last week. ‘We are making big steps towards transforming Turkey into an information society. We have no intention at all of blocking the internet,’ he said.

With around 18 million internet users, Google sites ranked as the largest property in Turkey, with more than 16 million visitors in April 2009 — 90% of the country’s online population.

‘Google is a vital source of information,’ Akdeniz said. ‘Google services have a major public benefit. The current issue cannot be reduced to a problem with a company,’ he said.

‘The current internet restrictions in Turkey absolutely violate basic freedoms guaranteed in the Constitution and international conventions. The current practice of restrictions is unacceptable, both legally and politically,’ Altiparmak told SETimes.

This content was commissioned for SETimes.com

Secret copyright treaty published: A secretive global negotiation on new copyright rules will not force countries to adopt ‘three strikes’ internet disconnection policies. A draft of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) has been published officially for the first time.

(Via OUT-LAW News.)

Cybercrime talks end in failure

US and Euros object to proposed changes: Plans to ratify an updated version of a global treaty against cybercrime have failed.…

(Via The Register – Public Sector.)

Turkey’s Internet law needs to be reformed or abolished, says OSCE media freedom representative

VIENNA, 18 January 2010 – Miklos Haraszti, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, today asked the Turkish authorities to bring Turkey’s internet law in line with OSCE commitments and other international standards on freedom of expression.

“In its current form, Law 5651, commonly known as the Internet Law of Turkey, not only limits freedom of expression, but severely restricts the citizens’ right to access information,” said Haraszti, commenting on a new report commissioned by his office on the blocking measures provided by the law.

The report, prepared by Yaman Akdeniz, an internationally renowned expert on cyber rights, contains a legal review and detailed recommendations.

“At present, 3,700 Internet sites are blocked in Turkey, including YouTube, GeoCities, and Google sites. Even as some of the content that is deemed ‘bad’, such as child pornography, must be sanctioned, the law is unfit to achieve this. Instead, by blocking access to entire websites from Turkey, it paralyzes access to numerous modern file sharing or social networks,” said Haraszti.

Haraszti, who presented the report at Bilgi University in Istanbul, Ankara State University and at the International Law Congress of the Ankara Bar Association on 13 and 14 January, noted that, while in Turkey, he was unable to access even the OSCE’s YouTube website.

OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Miklos Haraszti (r) in a panel discussion with Turkish Internet experts Dr. Yaman Akdeniz (l) and Dr. Kerem Altiparmak (c) at Ankara State University, 14 January 2010. (OSCE/Nora Kovacs)

“The results make the means unjustifiable,” he said. “Blocking access inside of Turkey is an affront to the public’s right to the entirety of the Internet. Additionally, some of the official reasons to block the Internet are arbitrary and political, and therefore incompatible with OSCE’s freedom of expression commitments.”

He added: “Besides pointing out the dangers of the Internet law, I also have to repeat that the Turkish legal framework still fails to protect freedom of expression. Numerous Criminal Code provisions are applied against media workers, and as a result, journalists risk imprisonment for carrying out their work.”

“Therefore ‘reform or abolish’ the Internet Law is our main recommendation. I hope that the Turkish authorities will soon remove the blocking provisions that prevent Turkish citizens from being part of today’s global information society.”

The report is also available at www.osce.org/fom.

FT.com / Media – Turkey to face European Court on YouTube ban

By David O’Byrne in Istanbul
Published: November 30 2009 16:57 | Last updated: November 30 2009 16:57

Turkey’s controversial censorship of the internet video sharing site YouTube is to be challenged in the European Court of Human Rights, a Turkish internet users group announced on Monday.

According to Mustafa Akgul, head of Turkey’s Society for Internet Technology, the society has taken the step having exhausted all legal avenues in Turkey to force the lifting of the ban, which was imposed in May 2008.

‘Our first case asking for the ban to be lifted was rejected on the grounds that we should have opened it within one week of the ban being applied, a ruling which was repeated by a higher court,’ said Mr Akgul.

‘Neither court actually listened to our objections to the ban, which are that it infringes freedom of expression and that the process is completely arbitrary,’ he said, adding that most bans have been imposed simply as a result of random complaints to Turkey’s Telecommunications Authority.

Mr Akgul explained the authority then automatically imposes the ban via an extra-judicial process in which no one is invited to submit a defence, and no details are published of the reasoning behind the ban which is indefinite and not subject to appeal.

Mr Akgul said expects the European Court process to take around three years but confirms that the ban inconveniences few internet users in Turkey as most have discovered that all banned sites can easily be accessed by changing their computer’s internet access settings or by using internet proxy sites such as Vtunnel.com.

Those using such ruses apparently include Recip Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s Prime Minister, who last year responded to a question from a journalist concerning the ban by pointing out that if he could access the site, so could everyone else in Turkey.

YouTube was first blocked in Turkey in 2007 when a court ordered the telecommunications authority to ban the site for hosting videos insulting the founder of modern Turkey Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, a crime which carries stiff penalties in Turkey.

YouTube’s owners Google responded by agreeing to block access to any videos in breach of Turkish law to anyone accessing them from a Turkish IP address – a move which saw the ban temporarily lifted.

However the ban was re-imposed when Google refused to accede to the courts demands that the videos should be blocked throughout the world in order to ‘protect the sensitivities’ of Turks living in other countries.

As Turkey’s telecommunications authority publishes no details of its rulings no one is sure exactly how many web sites have been banned in Turkey.

But YouTube is far from alone with some estimates of the number of banned sites running into the tens of thousands.

Banned sites include those accused of sharing recorded music, those accused of hosting child pornography, sites hosting blogs accused of containing material which breaches Turkish law and, curiously, the home page of English comedian and folk singer Richard Digance, whose crime may or may not be having penned a poem entitled ‘The Turkey’, lamenting the fate of the Christmas Turkey.

TSK’s Web site plan not based on legal grounds, observers say: “TSK’s Web site plan not based on legal grounds, observers say

10 November 2009, Tuesday
NERGİHAN ÇELEN / DİLEK HAYIRLI İSTANBUL

A large number of intellectuals, jurists and academics have criticized the reasoning recently offered by the General Staff for the establishment of several Web sites by the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) to back the military’s psychological warfare against civilian groups, terming the plan ‘illegal’ as it contravened a regulation passed in 2007.

The General Staff announced last week that the Web sites were established following plans and directives from the Prime Ministry in 2000, when the government was led by a coalition under former Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit. The announcement, however, was far from satisfying the questions in intellectuals’ minds. According to intellectuals, directives dating back to a post-coup era should no longer be in effect. The directives for the establishment were given in the wake of the Feb. 28, 1997 unarmed overthrow of the civilian government.

‘The directives of the Prime Ministry given after the Feb. 28 junta period cannot be in effect in our day. They [the TSK] are fully aware of this fact, but point to those directives as a pretext for its illegal activities. There has always been a circle that wanted a continuation of the Feb. 28 period. Even a general once said the period would last a thousand years. The beast which was born after Feb. 28 has not been killed. It has continued to exist in a mutated form,’ noted Hasan Celal Güzel, a former minister and currently a columnist.

The existence of the TSK’s Web sites was revealed in an e-mail sent by a military officer to a number of newspapers and journalists last week. The officer, who wished to remain anonymous, claimed that the armed forces established 42 Web sites as part of their psychological warfare against ‘dangerous’ civilian groups, which were categorized as ‘reactionary,’ ‘separatist,’ ‘pro-Justice and Development Party [AK Party]’ and ‘anti-TSK.’

The armed forces also monitored the activities of more than 400 Turkish and foreign language Web sites. The plan against Web sites was devised at the Third Information Support Unit of the General Staff by a number of colonels and was coordinated by Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen. Hasan Iğsız, according to the officer. Chief of General Staff Gen. İlker Başbuğ was also reportedly informed about the plan.

Professor Mehmet Altan, a Star daily columnist, said members of the military who established the Web sites should be brought before the court. ‘If the military were a private company, it would have collapsed long ago. It is impossible to understand how the General Staff can defend itself with directives dating back to the Feb. 28 process,’ he noted.

According to Kamil Uğur Yaralı, head of the Jurists Association, the Prime Ministry directives in question were counteracted by a regulation passed in 2007. ‘The fact that they are still in effect shows that the Feb. 28 process still reigns over society like a nightmare,’ Yaralı added.

The existence of a religious political party in government (the now-defunct Welfare Party [RP]) led to the overthrowing of a coalition government on Feb. 28 in an unarmed military intervention, also known as the post-modern coup of 1997. Uneasy with the religious characteristics of the government, the General Staff started briefing members of the judiciary, university rectors and journalists on religious fundamentalism at its headquarters. The National Security Council (MGK) made a number of decisions in its meeting on Feb. 28, 1997, and presented them to Prime Minister Erbakan for approval. Erbakan was forced to sign the decisions and subsequently resigned.

The General Staff also announced last week that all of its controversial Web sites were deactivated long ago; however, most of them were updated earlier this year. The Web sites were established by retired Capt. Hasan Ataman Yıldırım, who is currently in jail for suspected membership in Ergenekon. Among the recently updated Web sites are www.irtica.org, www.naksilik.com, www.geocities.com/fethullahgercegi, www.nursi.info, www.irtica.net, www.ozgurgenc.net, www.stratejik.info and www.tskasker.com.

Press Release – 03 November, 2009

Never before have so many people been threatened or imprisoned for what the words they write on the internet.

As activists and ordinary citizens have increasingly made use of the internet to express their opinions and connect with others, many governments have also increased surveillance, filtering, legal actions and harassment. The harshest consequence for many has been the politically motivated arrest of bloggers and online writers for their online and/or offline activities, in some tragic cases even leading to death. Online journalists and bloggers now represent 45% of all media workers in prison worldwide.

Today, Global Voices Advocacy is launching a new website called Threatened Voices to help track suppression of free speech online. It features a world map and an interactive timeline that help visualize the story of threats and arrests against bloggers worldwide, and it is a central platform to gather information from the most dedicated organisations and activists, including Committee to Protect Bloggers, The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, Reporters without Borders, Human Rights Watch, CyberLaw Blog, Amnesty International, Committee to Protect Journalists, Global Voices Advocacy.

What blogger, where?

Finding accurate information about arrested and threatened bloggers and online writers is difficult for several reasons.

First, the secrecy surrounding online censorship and repression makes it extra difficult to be accurate. Not a single week passes without stories of arrests of yet another online journalist or activist in countries like Egypt or Iran, but the details and reasons are often shrouded in mystery.

Second, there is still some confusion about the definition of a “blogger”. Professional journalists are increasingly migrating to online media and blogs in pursuit of more freedom, blurring the old lines of definition. And many so-called cyber-dissidents in China, Tunisia, Vietnam, or Iran, do not have personal blogs. Other times, bloggers are arrested for their offline activity, rather than for what they have published online.

This confusion has sometimes made it hard for online free speech advocates to come up with a good strategies and partnerships to defend bloggers and online activists, but it has never been more important to try.

Let’s work together

At Global Voices we engage a community of authors, editors, and translators, who help keep us all informed of free speech and human rights abuses. With Threatened Voices we aim to open the process of reporting up even further to any person who has information.

We’re calling on those whose friends, relatives, colleagues, or compatriots, have been threatened to help create and update the profiles of those missing or under arrest, so we can seek additional sources, verify, and link to online campaigns dedicated to freeing them.

In the process, we are hoping to learn more about when, where, and to what extent bloggers are being subjected to abuse in different countries, so we can share that information widely with journalists, researchers, and activists, and work towards creating an internet where everyone can exercise their right to speak freely, and where bloggers in prison are not forgotten.

Help spread the word. Tweet, blog and update your facebook status about Threatened Voices!

Removed paper on Internet censorship trails in Australia, NZ, UK with NetClean Whitebox, 2009 – Wikileaks

From Wikileaks
Released October 21, 2009

Summary

This is a technology white paper written by an internet censorship company (”filter vendor”) about internet censorship system in many countries. The company, “Watxhdog International” is based in New Zealand and behind the censorship system used by New Zealand, parts of the UK and controversial ‘live pilot’ of the controversial mandatory ISP-level filtering in Australia. The latter trial is using the “ACMA” blacklist, three editions of which were released by WikiLeaks in critical articles. WikiLeaks was itself then added to the blacklist and became the subject of a police raid in Germany and Federal Police investigation in Australia.

The document briefly appeared on the following URL:

* http://www.watchdoginternational.net/images/listwhitepaper_3.pdf

which was linked from:

* http://www.watchdoginternational.net/index.php/whitepapers

The document, and all references to it, were then removed.

In particular, the document describes several problems with one prominent filtering product (NetClean Whitebox) that were uncovered during the recent ‘live pilot’ of mandatory ISP-level censorship in Australia, namely:

* ACMA test list containing a ‘?’ in the URL;
* ACMA test list containing a very long URL; and
* ACMA test list containing a high-traffic URL (youtube).

The paper is important because:

* It pre-empts the official Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) report into the ‘live pilot’, due shortly.
* It highlights that the ‘live pilot’ did not go smoothly, and that the NetClean Whitebox may not be suitable for filtering the ACMA blacklist.

This document may be especially important if the official DBCDE report fails to mention these issues.
The URL to the original whitepaper can be verified by searching for “listwhitepaper_3.pdf site:watchdoginternational.net” in google. However the document itself has not been cached.

DOWNLOAD/VIEW FULL FILE FROM
fastest (Sweden)