Enemies of the Internet

Yep this is another one of them preachy posts, once again accompanied by a nice Infographic from the good people of Open-Site, for a quick recap of similar posts click on the following links:

Technology production
Piracy
Online Activism


 Today's theme is sort of a companion piece to the one about Activism (though arguably they are all interconnected) its about those whom threaten all the good things the Internet gives us, including pornography and fan sites about obscure television shows an out of print pulp series.

From Open-site.org 

If you think that identity theft is the worst-case-scenario of Internet use, you clearly don’t live in any of the nations that make the list of top “Enemies of the Internet.” Not only do these governments monitor their citizens’ web activity, but they also make it nearly impossible for them to safely share and gather information through anonymous microblogs, Facebook pages or Twitter accounts. One nation sports a cyber police force that is larger than the city of Orlando, Florida. And when protests erupted in another country, Twitter accounts were created for the sole purpose of diverting citizens from spreading information. Although these nations represent the extremes of national cybersecurity, the measures they use are based in legislative bills like SOPA, PIPA and CISPA. Check out the following infographic to find out which nations make this list. The next time you surf the web, think carefully about who’s watching you and who’s blocking you.

 If you're finding the graphic a bit small you can get the full sized version here.

Anyway I believe this is a fairly comprehensive list of nations that have less then liberal attitudes to the world wide web. In fact do take a look at both lists in the second image, we have the usual suspects China, Burma, Belarus, Russia, Cuba etc all well known for Authoritarianism but we also have a few surprises, Bahrain, Egypt and Tunisia, all of which had until the Arab Spring been well known for tourism and an accommodating attitude to Westerners.

And yet all of them at least embraced legislation that allowed their security forces to monitor the web. Why is this necessary? Well its quite easy to co-opt mainstream or old media either nationalise it or keep it in private hands and reach an agreement with the owners. Murdoch used to be the perfect example of this in the UK before the phone hacking scandal ruined his credibility and usefulness to government. Remember private ownership of the media doesn't necessarily equal independent or free.

Of course the problem with that framework is lying about a problem doesn't make the problem go away. People whom are frustrated and not getting anywhere through official means often go "underground"  and the internet has made this much easier to do and more effective to reach a larger audience. Owning the Times and Government FM simply won't stop dissent from spreading hence monitoring programs, and criticism laws (which we'll get to later) and don't hold your breadth for the new governments in Egypt and Tunisia to get rid of these particular laws. You would be surprised how useful such measures are once someone else has done the hard work and took the flack for implementing them.

For example in South Africa the ANC kept very unpopular Apartheid era laws in case their Administration faced an insurrection. Or did you think they just forgot about the legal justifications to arrest and beat them when they were the people's Vanguard?


Bahraini bloggers have often faced arrest and fines and that was before the protests against the Monarchy kicked off in full. Now you can expect a night raid and assault.

You may also wonder why Australia and France are on the list, after all those are civilised "Democratic" Western liberal nations. So why are they playing follow the leader with the Moustachioed Despots? Put simply because the same tensions that make surveillance and arbitrary detention so attractive to Governments exist in all nations. Can you honestly think of a nation that is completely homogeneous in outlook and harmonious? I can't... well that's not true North Korea (As its government portrays it anyway) seems pretty orderly, but given that its society is heavily militarised and has an extremely powerful police and intelligence service suggests that harmony is manufactured to some extent. And even they have very restrictive internet monitoring programs.

In the UK Tory and Labour governments have been blocking sites since the 90's. Some because of allegations of terrorism promotion and child pornography but, sometimes file sharing, I can't access Piratebay.Se anymore to give a recent example. In fact if I remember correctly in the 90's most websites blocked or shut down were Scatological pornsites (I'm not checking to make sure, you do that if you want too) which while unpleasant content wise isn't exactly what I'd call and economic or societal menace.

And of course I'm sure we're all familiar with the Alphabet bills in America and the EU trying to increase restrictions on the internet in our lands. SOPA, PIPA, CISPA, ACTA and so on. This initiatives need to be fought, not because they'll take away free films and music (even though its been debunked that piracy negatively affects those industries) but because they all legalise attacks from both government agencies and corporate "Rights holders" to attack our democratic space. You are naive in the extreme if you don't realise that these measures open the door to censorship of ideas and groups. And maybe you don't care all that much when the groups being shut down are "terrorists" or of the political and social opposition, but can you honestly guarantee that that is were the line stops? Would you be so complacent if the party bringing in these policies was one that opposed your beliefs and tried to silence your activism and debate?

Again credit to the Open-Site for the infographic.

More from this series:

Technology production
Piracy
Online Activism

Power to the Online People!

The nice people whom sent me this and this have once again shared a lovely infographic on a subject close to my heart Internet activism. And this ones animated too!

"Where were you when news of the tsunami hit Japan in 2011? How about when Michael Jackson died? Probably online, according to many experts who claim that social media has become the main media source for hundreds of millions of people. Not just in the U.S., either; Facebook alone has more than 900 million users spread across the globe as of 2012. Other social media giants like Twitter have facilitated revolution against unjust leaders and warned people of impending natural disaster. In fact, so many people regularly interact online that if the Internet were a nation, it would exceed the Americas, Europe and the Middle East combined in population. No wonder more than 13 million members of the online community used Reddit and other media platforms to protest SOPA, a proposed Internet censorship bill. Keep this graphic in mind next time you log on, because knowledge is power — and a little knowledge goes a long way in the Internet Age."

Naturally as a blogger it shouldn't surprise to learn that I'm in general agreement with most of the points it makes. I'm afraid I'm not too familiar with the point about the AID's protein but this site has some interesting information on it. I have to say though it surprises and impresses me.

 My area of "expertise" as far as the internet goes lie in activism and what is now called crowd sourcing. I think sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo whilst far from perfect and often used to fund vanity projects will and are offering inventors and artist types whom for one reason or another have difficulty securing funding in our corporate/government dominated investment and development sectors.

And of course the internet has enabled charities and support groups to raise awareness and funding. Before the internet advertising was limited both in frequency and audience. Also the time delay between a situation occurring and a response being coordinated has been drastically reduced. Action alerts and emergency appeals can start raising funds for emergency almost as soon as they develop.

 And then we get to my bread and butter, activism. Naturally being a politically minded fellow living in a remote village in an oft forgotten province I do a lot of stuff online. I should also mention I do a lot in my community too its just that opportunities are more limited. Anyway its undeniable that the World Wide Web has opened up some breathing room for "Radical" thought and given small groups s set of tools to agitate and recruit.

For example I only became aware of the Morning Star after doing a research project on British Communist groups on the internet. Regular readers of this blog will know that's my favourite and only regular newspaper. And that paper has a nation wide circulation and an extensive network of supporters.

And of course since the 90's there has been a blossoming of internet news sites, radio and video channels all representing many different view points and areas of interest. The infographic to my left wouldn't exist without the Internet. Now of course there are some out there whom are rather cynical about the use of the internet, words like "slacktivism" have been thrown around. And I have to disagree, there's an old Anarchist saying that goes "If Voting ever changed anything they'd make it illegal" I agree with the sentiment but disagree with the example since you know a lot of nations have indeed made voting illegal and according to some American Republican State governments are attempting to limit access to the ballot boxes so if that statement is true voting must have an effect.

Despite that I do think a good measuring stick for the worries of the establishment is what they move to ban or restrict. And the internet has seen increased monitoring and many nations from USA to China, EU to Russia have been drafting legislation to restrict websites and online activities.





However I think it is important to mention some very important Caveats, if the internet is to have any value as a tool for change and human progress it can only do so if it inspires and motivates action. You can make hundreds of viral videos, tweet to a hundred thousand followers and have a million likes on Facebook, but if no one gets up and starts acting nothing will be changed. Lets take the Mubarak example to our left, 90,000 pledges is great but if it wasn't for the years of hard struggle by a core of activists and labour unions battling the security services and getting them to compromise and on rare but important occasions back down no one would of risked turning in to Tahrir Square.

Ben Ali of Tunisia didn't resign and flee because he was embarrassed that Wikileaks publishing of his expense accounts and shopping lists trended on twitter he left because those documents validated the arguments and struggles of dedicated opponents whom had been risking prisons and beatings.

There's also another rather dark problem with the internet in regards to activism. It is quite easy to spread misinformation. I'm thinking of Kony 2012 that brilliantly crafted propaganda video, now I have no love for Kony and at first I was pretty impressed that someone was trying to raise awareness of his banditry. Unfortunately it wasn't long before alarm bells started ringing. Denying that the Lord's Resistance Army had an ideology to keep them isolated from sympathy. Condemning the LRA for its wicked deeds, child soldiers, civilian deaths, torture whilst praising the Ugandan government whose army is guilty of much the same, and worst of all imploring the audience to get America to deploy troops to Uganda to "Stop Kony" even though the Ugandan army already defeated him and the LRA haven't been active in Uganda (where the film wants troops to be deployed) since 2005 making a deployment there useless if that was the intended goal.

Now that looks convincing doesn't it? remember a picture may be worth a thousand words, but there's no guarantee those words are accurate

But that isn't the only instance of a suspiciously manufactured viral campaign. I can remember several years ago when the US and Colombia where negotiating for a Colombian Free Trade Agreement and greater collaboration in the "War on Drugs" there was a big fuss made of the start of a Facebook "No to FARC" campaign, that grew into street demonstrations in Bogotá and other cities and still occurs every year. Several Liberal papers were touting this a momentous occasion that would signal the end of armed conflict and a damning indictment of the Guerilla movement. There are a number of problems with this analysis, first officially about 53% of the population have access to the internet. And in reality it is much lower because the population in areas ran by FARC are at best estimates. Second most of those whom do have regular access to the internet tend to be from richer backgrounds, and are therefore much less likely to have sympathy with the aims of FARC a Marxist group. Now that doesn't mean that their opinions don't count it does however mean that that population will have a natural bias on this subject. Third their experiences with FARC are not likely to be typical, the group is in control of territory and as such operates as a political and social entity in addition to its military activities. The wealthy urbanites of Colombia are very unlikely to have knowledge of these programs and if they have any experience with the group is in relation to its military operations which negatively impact there social group further limiting there objectivity.

In addition those particular marches were organised by groups known to support the government. And the government gave employees the day off and called on people to join them.

“We want to live in a country at peace, a country without kidnappings or violence,” President Juan Manuel Santos said in an address in the little town of Villeta in the central department of Cundinamarca.
“No one should stay at home, no one should stay in their offices, because we are all going to march with a single purpose, a purpose that unites us all: to say 'yes' to liberty and 'no' to kidnapping,” he said at an event late Monday, according to a presidential statement."

To me this is the equivalent of using the Orange Order marches in Glasgow and statements by the Conservative party (Or party of British Unity as it desperately tried to re-brand itself North of Berrick Upon Tweed) to make a statement that the whole of Scotland hates the IRA, or wants Ulster to be part of the Union. It could be true but the evidence presented doesn't bear that conclusion out, and in fact actually undermines it.

In summary, the internet is a tool that supports a means to an end, it is not the end in and of itself. It is also not impenetrable, governments and corporations  can and are increasingly active online doing their best to curb activism and information leaks.If we wish to keep the internet as a driver for human progress then we have to be wary of the dangers and warn other of them as well as trumpet there successes.

Infographic created by Open-site.org

Generals and Labourers

Since Mubarak was toppled the Egyptian Militaries Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has been in difficult balancing act, on the one hand it wants to maintain as much of the old regime as possible (since you know it the days of corruption and Dictatorship where good for them) whilst giving the protesters, activists and Revolutionaries just enough reform to placate them enough to peel away there support and let fatigue take care of the more motivated rump.

Fortunately that plan seems to have come a cropper as they say recently. Protests have not only continued but increase and have in fact widened in scope I'm sure we all remember the recent diplomatic embarrassment for SCAF as it was forced to strain its ties with Israel and by extension Washington, but even that concession wasn't strong enough to prevent the Egyptian populations long simmering anger over the alliance of convenience between Cairo Tel-Aviv and Washington and their actions have forced the situation to deteriorate even further. The deal started by Sadat and strengthened under his successor Mubarak has not only meant that the noose was tightened on the Palestinian people, it also meant that Egypt formally an independent regional power became subservient to the United States global strategies.

Elsewhere in Egypt opposition to the Junta's domestic polices remain strong. Currnetly Egypts trade unions whom still face discrimination and oppression from the security services have kicked off a wave of strikes to force to the government to recognise there organisations and address there grievances. Labour Start (a partner of the Industrial Workers World)has a campaign on to pressure the Egyptian government -whom lets remember are desperate for some good press to encourage tourism and trade- to create a law(s) to acknowledge and protect workers rights. It can be found here.



Egyptian workers campaign for change in minimum wage.



Students demonstrate to dissolve appointed student bodies and an end to government informants spying on young activists and free debate.

Mission accomplished?

Well that was a hectic few days by the pyramids wasn't it. Mubarak after the daring camel charge made up of interior ministry thugs and there mates who wanted a quick pay check failed to do much other then get a snigger out of people watching the news, and kill a few people gets the hopes of his people up that he would finally leave, after all the protesters enthusiams for the army was cooling fast and the Americans his regimes and its security apparatus biggest financial backer slowly but surely inching its way to the protesters side -incidentally readers of blogs like the polemical report will no doubt recall a similar scenario occurred in Honduras) where the US government and the Emperor of change Obama did not side with the democracy advocating people- only to make a speech saying he'd stay till September when his "democratic" term is up only to have his military the last working pillar of his regime give him the boot, but given that he's amassed a fortune estimated at $70 billion -all paid for by a grateful state and populous- no doubt, in foreign banks all over the world his retirement prospects aren't as bleak as most in this tough financial times. But does that mean this is over and we can now move onto gawking at the next teetering middle eastern regimes attempts to protect there privilege? Well no theres still much to do in Egypt. Rather then an outright Democratic transfer of power to a constituent assembly or an equivalent, Egypt is now under the control of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) a council that has only previously been formed in times of war. Now much of the mainstream media is talking about the Turkish model of government where the military is the Supreme power but unlike in Pakistan is fine with letting the civilian politicians do the difficult task of actually running the country. It is argued that this is what has kept Turkey an over 90% Muslim nation that has on occasion elected "Islamist" parties of varying degrees to government like the current Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party* from sliding into the evils of fundamentalism. Just why Islamic countries require a strong secular officer corps while predominantly Christian nations could develop secular governance without them is rarely explained by advocates of the Turkish model.What is also overlooked is the role the military plays in Turkey's aggressive attitudes to preserving the Unity of the Turkish state. Its hard to see the continued oppression of the Ethnic Armenian's and Kurds not being dictated by the Chiefs of staff. And of course the main problem with the Turkish system other then the nagging thought that this was not what the people on the streets and in the squares wanted is that once established there is very little to keep the New Arabian Turkey from becoming the New Arabian Pakistan or Myanmar. Afterall that is how those nations became Stratocracies the military stepped in in times of crisis and then argued that they should keep power as they were the only ones strong enough to maintain stability. Who else but the Generals can effectively mediate between all those ethnic tribes spread out in Burmese valley's? who but the military can effectively maintain the order of Islamabad and expand it around the Federally Administered Tribal Areasfrom religious radicals? What is to stop SCAF from using Islamic terrorism or perhaps red revivals to justify there maintenance of there privilege? After all America and by extension the rest of the West where perfectly happy to support and fund the Security states of Ben Ali's Tunisia and Mubarak's Egypt (after his predecessor Sadat shifted Egypt to a Western alignment) why not rebuild the relationship with the Generals. Old habits do die hard remember. And I have to say so far SCAF have not exactly embraced the Democratic spirit, they've agreed to look at reforms in the future but so far seems more preoccupied with some good old fashion strike breaking. Aside from the obvious need to protect production and profits to appease the moneyed classes both at home and abroad the moves to restrict and then no doubt crush Labour activism in Egypt represents a pretty much standard procedure for Dictatorships, but especially so in Egypt. Those who read the Morning Star will probably know this but the protests and revolts in Egypt where not simply copy and pasting from Tunisia, they had been going on for a long time, the most common of which was Strike actions. Striking under Mubarak was more then just highlighting a wage grievance it was also a declaration of discontent with the regime. Thanks to Mubarak's crony capitalism all major manufacturing and finance assets where either owned outright by the state or snapped up by key entrepreneurs who where close supporters of the NDP, a big player in this scheme was the very same military-heads who are now running the show, hence why no Labour organisations of any kind where tolerated. Most strikes that couldn't be just threatened back in line where routinely tear gassed and beaten, a practice which looks set to continue if the Military gets its way. Fortunately though there are some encouraging signs that the people are not about to letup the pressure on there government no matter what hat it wears until this revolution is finished. 

 * The Justice and Development Party has recently shifted away from its religious base however due to its strong social conservatism can still be associated with the social trends in much the same way other European and American Conservatives draw their social code from their dominant variant of Christianity.

The Revolution Spreads

Fortunately the Revolt in Tunisia is not fizzling out as protesters continue to demand the removal and expulsion of all the higher ups of Ben Ali's regime, and seems even segments of the police and security forces are defecting no doubt in an attempt to focus the people's anger at their bosses, and the army appears to be slowly coming to the side of the population and giving up there neutrality. Overall its looking more promising that this revolt will successfully rid the country of its corrupt ruling class.







And we have even better as the Revolution is spreading throughout the Arab world. Egypt looks to be next as its previously demoralised and suppressed anti Mubarak and NDP movement appears to have been reinvigorated and is taking on the security apparatus despite the Egyptian governments massive numbers of police officers and 40 year attempt to siphon off discontent with a series of fraudulent elections, the last elections were more fraudulent then ever and only received 20% participation as can be seen in this report. Despite the repression it is quite clear to anyone with eyes that the people of Egypt want Mubarak and the NDP gone and an end to the 40 year emergency security law that has strangled Egyptisn freedoms ever since the death of Anwar El-Sadat at the hands of radical Islamist'sincidentally current Autarch Hosni Mubarak was wounded during the assassination. And an end to Eqypt's close ties to Washington and Tel-Aviv especially its collaboration with the strangling of Gaza.



Once again the strength of the peoples anger seems to be surprising the pundits. For those who wish to stay on top of the developments in Tunisia and Egypt then I can recommend these blogs Frontlines of Revolutionary Struggle
and Egypt protests
Photo Source here and here.