· March, 2013

Stories about Freedom of Speech from March, 2013

Iran: “We Want Our Children to be Free”

The mother of dead blogger, Sattar Beheshti,said in a message in YouTube that she gave her son for Iran and added “we want our children to be free”. Sattar Beheshti died...

31 March 2013

Trying to Get Through: Hungarians Send Video Messages to Prime Minister

Young Hungarians are shocked by the government's stubborn refusal to acknowledge their protests and their demands for a more democratic decision-making. To get their message across, four young people launched a new blog on March 22, asking fellow citizens to send short video messages to the Prime Minister with their thoughts on his governance.

31 March 2013

As Liberal Russia's Secret Superhero ‘KermlinRussia’ Unmasks, Some See Evil

RuNet Echo

Arseny Bobrovsky, the owner of a Russian PR firm called “Daily Communications,” would be a thoroughly typical example of Moscow’s “creative class” liberals, were it not for one thing: Bobrovsky has a secret identity. At least he did, anyway, until March 25, 2013, when he and his accomplice Katya Romanovskaya outed themselves to the world as the authors of KermlinRussia, one of the most popular accounts on Russian Twitter.

30 March 2013

Censoring Censorship in China

The above screen capture of a local news brief has gone viral on Chinese social media yesterday. It said: “Recently Myanmar has unblocked Facebook, the world's most popular social media...

29 March 2013

Regime Critic Goes Missing in Tajikistan

An outspoken regime critic and leader of a minority ethnic community has gone missing in Tajikistan. The country's internet users have largely missed his disappearance. The reactions from those who have paid attention to this case show that xenophobic attitudes run deep within Tajik society.

28 March 2013

Venezuela: New Wave of Online Threats

Several Venezuelan cartoonists, journalists, writers and artists have been the target of a series of threats through Twitter, telephone and text messages, according to news portal Noticias 24. They began...

26 March 2013

Saudi Arabia Threatens to Block Skype and WhatsApp

Saudi Arabia, an Enemy of the Internet, is threatening to block a number of popular communication tools, such as Skype and mobile messaging service WhatsApp, unless the operating companies agree to infringe on the privacy of users and monitor them.

25 March 2013

Digital Freedom: Principles and Concepts

Advox

The Egyptian Institute for Freedom of Thought and Expression issued its first statement on digital freedom, a simplified research paper to propose definitions for digital rights and related principles which the paper summarised as: universal access, freedom of opinion and expression, the right to privacy, and the right to creativity, development and innovation.

25 March 2013

China's Red Army Returns Online and Hunts Students

In China's Southern Guangdong province, a local University has been monitoring student conversation online and controlling their negative sentiment for the last 3 years.The news triggered outrage online; many think the university has violated student privacy and demanded a stop to the system.

25 March 2013

University Builds Internet Red Army in China

Since 2010, Guangdong Baiyun University started running a “Students’ Internet and Social Media Information Monitoring” team to watch students’ online activities. More from Off Beat China.

25 March 2013

Saudi Minister Threatens a Twitter User Online

Saudi Arabia's Information and Culture Minister Abdelaziz Khoja allegedly threatened to sue a Twitter user – for insulting him on the microblogging platform. The user called the minister a "remote control" in the hands of those with money and power and the minister responded that he could sue him, if he confessed his name.

20 March 2013