Web Censorship on the Increase 132
mid-devonian writes "Close on the heels of the temporary blocking of YouTube by a Turkish judge, a group of academics has published research showing that Web censorship is on the increase worldwide. As many as two dozen countries are blocking content using a variety of techniques. Distressingly, the most censor-heavy countries (which includes China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Burma and Uzbekistan) seem to be passing on their technologically sophisticated techniques to other areas of the world. 'New censorship techniques include the periodic barring of complete applications, such as China's block on Wikipedia or Pakistan's ban on Google's blogging service, and the use of more advanced technologies such as 'keyword filtering', which is used to track down material by identifying sensitive words.'"
Not somebody else's problem (Score:5, Informative)
Web censorship is not something that only happens halfway around the world in countries like Uzkbekistan and Burma. If you're from the UK, meet Cleanfeed [wikipedia.org], a soon-to-be compulsory system for blocking "illegal" content. Only a select group of secretive internet wizards [wikipedia.org] know how it works, and a circle of elders living deep in the mountains [wikipedia.org] are in charge of deciding exactly what is and isn't "illegal content". Not everybody runs it just yet, but its effects are already being felt [wikipedia.org].
Re:government (Score:3, Informative)