BlogSecurity introduces an article by Sarah Turner:
Sarah Turner is a BA Hons in Business Studies and currently works as a Marketing Manager; she has speciliased in the IT security sector for almost 2 years.

"Bloggers are often the only real journalists in countries where the mainstream media is censored or under pressure. Only they provide independent news, at the risk of displeasing the government and sometimes courting arrest." - Bloggers Handbook

Recently, Amnesty International issued a warning that the entire Internet will change if censorship is allowed to continue. Amnesty’s anti-censorship site irrepressible.info states:

"The Internet is a new frontier in the struggle for human rights. Governments – with the help of some of the biggest IT companies in the world – are cracking down on freedom of expression."

Censorship has been reported in China, Vietnam, Tunisia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Syria. Recently, many Fijians spoke out online against their new government. The government subsequently threatened to arrest any suspected bloggers, but the bloggers continued, as they believed that it was important that their points of view were heard. In February, an Egyptian blogger was imprisoned for four years for insulting Islam and defaming the President of Egypt.

But is censorship really as bad as Amnesty is making out? Or is it just that local laws are being adhered to, as many alleged censors say? Cultural barriers can also potentially lead many people to believe that governments and organisations are over-reacting and restricting people’s freedom of speech. What may be an acceptable discussion topic in one country, culture or religion may be the complete opposite in another.

Imprisonment of bloggers raises another question, does it turn ordinary citizens into activists? It’s been reported that many relatives of incarcerated bloggers have changed from living a normal life to protesting for bloggers’ releases and becoming outspoken and leading demonstrations.

Reporters Without Borders has recently released a blogging handbook, which aims to help bloggers to blog anonymously and evade censorship.

Whether or not online censorship is really as bad as some are reporting may be a personal point of view, but it’s certainly an important issue that’s not going away and must be considered carefully before any individual states any particularly strong points of view that they may have on certain topics.

For additional information, Sarah Turner can be contacted via our Contact form.