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Aiding the enemy: Congress's New Dilema
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News and Politics :: Sino-American :: Human rights and personal freedoms :: Includes Translations :: News and Perspectives ::
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posted Sunday, 15 January 2006
Given that the world's headline have recently been brimming over with stories about the ever increasing number of American companies that have been checking their morals at the door as they rush commit the acts of censorship and self censorship necessary to be part of China's burgeoning internet market, it will probably come as little surprise to observers to hear that Congress now appear ready to look a lot closer at the distinctly 'un-American' activities of some American companies and, if necessary, to put a stop to them.
Congressional Voices
According to its Chairman - Republican Representative Christopher Smith - the House of Representatives Subcommittee on Human Rights is scheduled to convene soon, to hear testimonies from human rights group and corporate interests, including Microsoft, Yahoo, Cisco Systems and Google, in order to fathom out embarrassing problem of 'the complicity of US companies in internet censorship overseas' and what legislation or guideline, if any, should be introduced in order to put a stop to it.
Though approaching the issue from different political angles, and having different levels of legislative influence/ability, the Congressional Human Rights Caucus will also be holding its own independent hearing under the stewardship of Democrat Timothy Ryan, in regards to the same thorny topic.
The hearings are scheduled for Mid and early February respectively, with no firm date yet available for the convening of the Human Rights subcommittee, and a date of 1 February set for the Human Right Caucus.
After a noticable period of near silence from America's administration, much of this new attention is thought to be due to a combination of bad press; with the world's newspapers questioning why American companies have been failing to uphold American values, and a number of reports from human rights groups - which have been carrying fewer questions, and more criticisms.
| “[Technology and expertise provided by US companies] allows the authorities to read data transmitted on the Internet and to spot 'subversive' key words” Reporters Without Borders – Report on information freedom in China |
A great deal of this new attention is also thought, in no small part, to have something to do with recent reports from closer to home. Including those from influential Washington think-tanks, which have bee backing up, rather than disputing, international opinions.
| "U.S. companies continue to play an active role in China's Internet censorship, providing hardware, software and content filtering services" US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, 2005 |
A Complex Issue?
Although welcomed by human rights interests and freedom of speech campaigners alike, this new interest from Congress brings a great many potential complications with it, and has lead to the asking of a number of important questions, including:
- What can be done?
- Exactly how involved the federal government should be (legislation V Guideline)
- Who should legislation/guidelines apply to?
- How should legislation/guidelines be enforced?
- Should they be enforced at all (self regulation)?
- Are certain forms of censorship acceptable (censorship to uphold legal/moral standards)?
- Where does responsibility for censorship begin/end?
Conversely, other groups actively prefer a more informal approach. Favoring the drafting of self-regulatory guidelines and a 'voluntary code of practice', which companies could choose to follow, or ignore, as as appropriate.
Additionally, and in the light of existing confusions, a number of observers have also voiced strong fears that, unless measures are well drafted, and set within a strong framework, they could potentially have serious and unexpected repercussions for American businesses, or even be open to abuse
The Moral Paradox
Among the fears being held by some, one of the greatest is that, unless clearly defined, any Congressional moves to stop US companies from being complicit in overseas censorship, may have unexpected side effect, particularly where freedom of expression conflicts with moral imperatives, and that any new legislation could potentially be used to put US companies in the impossible position having to choose between breaching local laws or face censure back home.
As such, worried parties have cited a recent case where the French arm of Yahoo, at the request of the French judiciary, censored its users by removing items relating to the Nazi (ナチ / 納粹) from its French auction and dissemination services
Critics have voiced that the same legislation that would prevent US a company from censuring a Uygur website seeking to 'revise' Chinese history in regards to 新疆 (Xingjiang), and to oust Han rule in East Turkestan, could, potentially, also be also used to compel Yahoo to allow French citizens to deny the holocaust and trade in Nazi (ナチ / 納粹) memorabilia on their website.
While, under French law, the sale of items, promotion of ideologies, or denial of war crimes, relating to the the Nazi (ナチ / 納粹), is forbidden, all of these activities are protected as basic human rights under the US constitution; which guarantees freedom of expression and association, even in the case of revisionism and hate speeches.
| "It is better to allow those who preach racial hatred to expend their venom in rhetoric rather than to be panicked into embarking on the dangerous course of permitting the government to decide what its citizens may say and hear” Judge Bernard M. Decker, US District Court (Speaking in regards to National Socialist Party V Village of Skokie) |
As such, the removal of Nazi (ナチ / 納粹) item from Yahoo's French website, under local law, could be constituted as illegal censorship under any new US laws governing complicity in overseas censorship.
Similarly, the same legislation that would punish a US search engine for blocking access to sites about democratic reform, in China, could also be used to punish them for blocking Chinese users who are trying access pornographic or 'adult' art sites. Which which are illegal in China, but protected under US statutes on Freedom of Expression,
The Economic Paradox
In addition to moral issues, Congress also faces a number of stark concerns from the business community. With US companies stating bluntly that, if they refuse to comply with Chinese demands, and the requirement that all web services must be hardwired for censorship, China will simply switch to other foreign companies that are more willing to please.
Warning that, In effect, any legislation to enforce domestic constitutional standards on companies working in China could 'hand American contracts, and American jobs, to oversea competitors who are not 'burdened' by such regulations'.
| "If Yahoo [doesn't do] business in China, someone else will" Sonia Arrison, Director of Technology Studies, free-Market Pacific Research Institute. |
Observers have also raised questions regarding the scope of any legislation, and its application to culpability and 'duel use' technology. Specifically:
- To what level a company can be held responsible if its products are used for censorship
- Exactly what constitutes an American company.
Participant, Bystander, or Blameless Tool?
While Cisco's products are is used extensively to filter the internet in China, and to block sites deemed 'unhealthy' by Beijing, they can also be used and used for legitimate filtering efforts, including the filtering out of sites containing child pornography or terrorist bomb making instructions.
Additionally, Ciso's products are designed for network control, with filtering, and thus censorship capabilities, being only a small part of a much larger package of features.
Cisco's products can also be purchased, installed, or reprogrammed for active censorship, without Cisco's knowledge, assistance, or consent.
As American as Fried Tofu?
Further more, Cisco is a multi national company with operations and facilities in a significant number of countries. Leading observers to question whether or not it could simply 'spin off' its China arm in order to escape legislation; Effectively creating a new company that could operate outside US law.
How any future legislation might deal with such an eventuality is, as yet, unclear.
Other Voices
Though coming at a particularly public juncture of the row, current efforts are not the first time that legislation to prevent the censorship of foreign internet access has been proposed to Washington. Though, most previous proposals have been broader in scope, and have focused more on the prevention of censorship, than the disassociation of US companies from it.
The Global Internet Freedom Act?
In October 2002, Congressmen Christopher Cox and Thomas Lantos proposed legislation (The Global Internet Freedom Act) to create the 'Office of Global Internet Freedom'. A body working under the auspices of the 'Broadcasting Board of Governors'; the federal agency that maintains the 'Voice of America' and 'Radio Free Asia'.
Under proposals, the Office of Global Internet Freedom would have the remit to "develop and implement a comprehensive global strategy to combat state-sponsored and state-directed Internet jamming, and persecution of those who use the Internet."
| "The Chinese government, and sadly, too many other regimes around the world, have been aggressively blocking access to the Internet, monitoring Internet activity and punishing those who seek only to share information" Christopher Cox, Congressman, US (speaking before the US-C ESRC, June 2003) |
Initially, OGIF was proposed as having a budget of $US100 Million over two years, however, this was paired down to $US16 in July 2003.
Controversy
Despite the apparent benevolent intentions of the proposed body and bill, critics have however questioned whether they would really be a force for the preservation and promotion of global internet freedoms, or if they would merely be another avenue for the furtherance of US ideologies. With critics asking whether such an office would, for example, fight with equal vigor to protect websites promoting socialism in South America, as it would sites promoting US style democracy in China.
Irony
Ironically, just as any new legislation to prevent US companies from assisting repressive regimes in censoring the internet could potentially force US companies to host or promote hate speeches, or force them out of expanding markets – handing sizable economic advantages over to foreign competitors – it is also thought that the actions by the OGIF might have a number 'undesirable' consiquences.
Currently, it is thought that a substantial component of the OGIF budget would likely be devoted to the development of filter avoidance software, and the creation of proxy/cached servers to allow people to access information without fear of being traced or identified. However if left open and unmonitored - as would be required in order to be trustworthy to many seeking access to politically sensitive websites - the same systems that would allow users in China to access pro-democracy sites without being blocked or traced, could also be used by pedophiles and other sexual offenders in America to 'cloak' their identities and gain access to pornographic material, and by those seeking to commit online crime against US citizens, including perpetrating acts of identity theft and the collecting of information that could be used to commit acts of terrorism.
Explanations, or Excuses?
In the face of criticism, both from home and abroad, most US based most multi-nationals, involved in Chinese censorship claims, have fallen back to two common lines of defense;
- That they are following local laws, and have no choice but to comply if they wish to continue to operate in that market.
| "wherever we do business around the world [governments] impose restrictions on access to information, and of course we are obliged by law to follow them" Debbie Frost, Google |
- That they are providing a services or product, and cannot be held accountable if the client misuses or abuses it.
| "Our perspective is that it's the user, not Cisco, that determines the functionality and uses to which the technology is put" Terry Alberstein, Asia-Pacific Spokesperson, Cisco Systems |
Some companies, most notably the internet each giant Google, have also responded that their 'apparent acts of censorship' actually have no impact on access to information in countries like China because of restrictions that are already in place.
In an earlier statement, representatives from Google issued the defense that, while they did prevent users from searching for pages containing certain keywords, and they did ban certain stories from their news feed system, this did not impact on the overall experience of Chinese users because they was merely filtering out pages that Chinese users would not be able to access anyway, due to existing government censorship; In effect saying that, because users could not open a page, there was little point in returning a heading for it in a Chinese search engine.
| "The experience for users in China searching on Google.com has not been changed by Google in any way" Debbie Frost, Google |
While proponents have claimed that Google is merely excluding 'unreachable pages', and that in doing so it is sparing users the frustration of being presented with pages that they cannot open, critics have equally voiced that Google's actions are harmful because they not only prevented users from learning of a pages existence, so that they could use anti-censorship software to view it, but that it also created the dangerous illusion that, because a user could not find pages on a certain topic, that there were no pages in existence on that topic. Thus creating a highly polarized, and very dangerous, environment, where it appears that no dissenting information exists.
Complicity
So far, US Companies implicated in Chinese censorship include, but are not limited to:
- Yahoo – Handing over of documents and IP record necessary to convict the journalist Shi Tao, and the long term blocking of 'key words' from its Chinese language search engine.
- Google – Active censorship of its Chinese language of news service and search engine.
- Cisco Systems – Complicity in censorship through the provision of internet filtering and monitoring systems
- Microsoft – The banning of 'key words' from its Chinese language blogging service and the recent deletion a prominent pro-democracy blog at the request of the Chinese state
- Sun Microsystems – The Supply of advanced filtering equipment
- Websense – The Supply of internet censorship software
Readers are free to add their own names to the above list using the comments box below.
View Comments/Add a Comment (4)
1. Brian left...
Monday, 16 January 2006 6:54 pm :: http://www.brianmathes.com/blog
You do a good job of presenting the numerous concerns surrounding the issue
of corporate responsibility given the political situation in China, the
basic dillema between access and the morality of assisting in censorship.
2. ACB left...
Monday, 16 January 2006 8:41 pm :: http://angrychineseblogger.blog-city.com
"more nefarious action such as content deletion or provision of identity
information for persecution should be decried and punished."
3. Brian left...
Thursday, 19 January 2006 10:27 pm
I'm not sure that a decision by Yahoo to turn in information about a
terrorist would be looked down upon by American authorities. I think the
government has spent enough time decrying terrorism as a tactic that they
would have a lot of trouble criticising Yahoo in this case. I also believe
that in this instance the benefits of enacting a regulation would outweigh
any potential problems that such a law would produce. We're talking
freedom of speech for a billion plus people versus a theoretical dillema
that may hopefully be resolved should it pop up.
4. ACB left...
Thursday, 19 January 2006 11:03 pm :: http://angrychineseblogger.blog-city.com
"I think the government has spent enough time decrying terrorism as a
tactic that they would have a lot of trouble criticising"