Russian Censorship Group Seeks Chinese Help to Better Control Internet

[uhnope]

Source: VOA

MOSCOW— Russian authorities are seeking greater control of information on the internet, with some who favor tighter restrictions looking to China. Russia's Safe Internet League, an influential lobby, hosted a first-ever forum Wednesday in Moscow with China's top internet censors, including Fang Binxing, known as the "Father of the Great Firewall of China." Comments from speakers at the event underscored the desire for authorities to further limit and control information online.

Lu Wei, China’s cybersecurity and internet policy chief, is shown at the World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, China, Nov. 19, 2014. He reportedly said at a recent Russian forum that online freedom was not a right but a responsibility to be kept in check. Fang lectured on “cyber sovereignty,” arguing that countries’ borders apply to the online world as well and foreign “interference” should not be tolerated.

China’s cybersecurity and internet policy chief Lu Wei said that online freedom was not a right but a responsibility to be kept in check lest it lead to terrorism, according to a tweet from a Financial Times reporter. Lu echoed Kremlin rhetoric, saying Western media were waging an “information war” against their countries.

Both Chinese and Russian speakers lamented American companies’ dominance of the internet. Konstantin Malofeev, who is chairman of the Safe Internet League and is linked to both the Kremlin and the Russia-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine, said Russia should learn from China’s internet censorship practices and assert its sovereignty online.
...
“I think this reflects their level of desperation inside of the Kremlin,” said Andrei Soldatov, co-author of "The Red Web: The Struggle Between Russia's Digital Dictators and the New Online Revolutionaries," who spoke to VOA via Skype. “They have these coming elections. And, it seems they need desperately to find some sort of solution to be absolutely sure that they can control the internet before the elections.”

Read more: http://www.voanews.com/content/russian-censorship-group-seeks-chinese-help-better-control-internet/3308924.html

[Sunlei]

1. someone needs to blanket the world with free wifi satellites

[forest444]

2. He forgot that this headline has a mirror image:

U.S. Censorship Group Seeks British Help to Better Control Internet

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/01/nsa-paid-gchq-spying-edward-snowden

[Democat]

4. Where does this article say anything about censorship?

Do you post a reactionary "America sucks" reply to every thread?

[uhnope]

5. thank you

yes, it seems that poster or someone has to stink up almost every thread that way. It's either clinical or professional

[forest444]

6. You're going to sit there and call people names all day long?

Last edited Sun May 1, 2016, 01:01 PM - Edit history (1)

DU is not a schoolyard you know.

[forest444]

7. So thin-skinned. That's exactly the attitude that brought us Dubya.

Criticism is the cornerstone of democracy, as anyone on DU will tell you.

I'm surprised you don't know that, having already been here for 15 years.

[PersonNumber503602]

14. I think the issue people are having is that there is little hesitance for people to criticize the US

on this site and on many other sites. In fact we can go to the front page and find many threads and discussions that are critical of the US. Which is fine and not many people take issue with that, as many feel that "criticism is the cornerstone of democracy". It's just weird that when negative information about other countries come up, particularly China or Russia, there is always someone there to direct the conversation away from them and back to the US. This is despite the fact there are likely thousands or even tens of thousands of threads about the NSA programs. If someone posted a new news article about some recently discovered NSA program that put cameras in every American's bathroom, wouldn't you find it odd if someone posted a link to the story about Russia's attempt to emulate the Chinese censorship in some attempt to minimize the NSA spycams?

The vast majority of the posts in this thread are about the US rather than Russia. Not fully your fault, as everyone (including myself) responding are contributing to it, but it does seem like a problem. You also didn't state your opinion about what the article is about. Do you care, or do you only care about the America because you feel the US is the greatest country in the world and the only country that matters?

[forest444]

17. That's just what I told OLTG below, when he mentioned that many in gov. find the policy justifiable.

I'm sure they do, and can even rationalize it pretty well - but that's exactly what the Russias and the Chinas of the world tell their own people.

It's still an extremely slippery slope, especially given what we know know about how little the NSA actually oversees these programs. I'm sure the countries doing this have this same problem (we know the U.K. does).

And yes, I suppose I do care at least a little. I wouldn't bother posting my thoughts on the matter otherwise, let me tell you.

Thank you for your very well-considered reply, btw. A real contribution to the discussion at hand, and something a couple of these others could definitely take a page from.

[pintobean]

15. Weren't you just complaining about name calling?

Yeah, I even served on the 1-6 leave it jury for that complaint. Now you're calling someone thin skinned.

[forest444]

16. If you consider that name calling,

Last edited Sun May 1, 2016, 02:16 PM - Edit history (1)

the thin-skinned one here is you.

[pintobean]

18. I don't know what "think-skinned" means

but, I was going by your apparent standards. I don't think you were called a name, yet we got an alert and a whine.

[forest444]

19. What, you've never seen a typo?

How old are you, anyway.

[One_Life_To_Give]

8. Doesn't mention Censorship from NSA?

Reading what people say/do and possibly try to hide on the internet is not the same as censoring. NSA monitoring and the Great Firewall of China are two totally different programs. Both in terms of how they do it as well as the goals of doing it.

[forest444]

9. But it's very effective at fostering the most insidous censorship of all:

Self-censorship.

I don't think anyone seriously doubts that it's used to blackmail people of influence as well - particularly those in politics and the press.

[One_Life_To_Give]

10. Doubt most Europeans give a crap what NSA thinks of their posts

Just as most american's don't care what China thinks about their opinions posted on the net either. The CIA is instead relegated to having it's own fact check site to try and counter (dis)information in a public way, which is as free speech/thought/expression should be.
Not at all the same as China's Firewall and certainly less effective than China's tying citizens financial/credit ratings to their posting history and friends history of support/dissent with their anointed leaders.

[forest444]

12. I hope you're right.

But remember that that's exactly what the Russians and Chinese tell their people.

And as under-regulated as we know know the access to such information at the NSA to be, the odds of it being misused are probably very good.

[uhnope]

11. "I don't think anyone seriously doubts that it's used to blackmail people of influence "

oh, please tell us more about this CT. The NSA is blackmailing people? Really?

[PersonNumber503602]

13. I would give you examples of how the NSA blackmails citizens, but they are blackmailing me

and that prevents me from sharing this information. Seriously.

[DetlefK]

3. That idea is actually older than the internet.

William Gibson wrote the sci-fi "Neuromancer"-trilogy, accidently predicting things like the internet, virtual reality, social media...

In his novels, there is the lunatic, insulated and insanely rich Tessier-Ashpool clan. They made their fortune by renting out internet-servers in orbit.

----------------

Space is international territory. This server-in-space-thing could work... until Russia and China start actively shooting them down.

And there's the risk of crime and terrorism with these independent servers.

[Blue_Tires]

20. kick