Warning to Students: Watch What You Tweet
Students at a Pennsylvania high school are told by local police that what they tweet could be a crime.
There Are Things Facebook Doesn’t Want You To See
Two more examples of the social media giant's rather peculiar standards about female nudity.
“Removed From the Internet”: Dianne Feinstein’s Bizarre Call for Censorship
No, senator, you cannot remove a book from the internet.
China’s Struggle with Online Censorship – New Lengths to Control the Internet
One of the most prevalent types of censorship today is solely web-based. The Chinese government's online blockade called the "Great Firewall" is one of the most famous examples. Usually acting out of what it considers defensive purposes, the "Great Firewall" operators have recently taken on a more offensive role that affects both China and the rest of the world: Cyber attacks [...]
Holding Publishers Liable: What’s Wrong with the SAVE Act
Congressional efforts to punish online sex trafficking are overbroad, counterproductive and will chill free speech.
It’s Starting to Get Chilly
And I’m not talking about the frosty weather hitting New York City this week. A new report by NCAC coalition member PEN American Center, “Global Chilling: The Impact of Mass Surveillance on International Writers” finds that government surveillance in democratic countries is chilling free speech, driving novelists, editors, poets, and journalists to self-censor their work. The numbers are particularly frightening: 75% [...]
NCAC Co-signs Letter to US Senate Expressing Concerns Over SAVE Act
(Update: NCAC signed on to another letter in January 2015 organized by the Center for Democracy & Technology.) NCAC and other organizations concerned with human rights sent the below letter to the Unites States Senate to convey strong opposition to S.2536, the "Stop Advertising Victims of Exploitation" (SAVE) Act. While we believe that Congress should provide additional funding for victims [...]
EFF Probes Troubling Social Media Monitoring Policies in AL and TN
Late in September, in observance of the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s 13 Necessary and Proportionate Principles on Surveillance, NCAC noted thematic links between the NSA’s far-reaching surveillance tactics and those of public schools in the country. There, we observed that the underlying impulses behind surveillance on the national level and on the local level were uniform. This need to monitor and [...]
Spiked: Should Even Hate Speech Be Free Speech?
To outsiders, 21st century Britain must look like a pretty liberal country. We don’t imprison people for their political opinions. We no longer seek to ban so-called “obscene” novels, as the authorities tried to do with D.H. Lawrence’s “Lady Chatterley’s Lover” when the unexpurgated version was first published in 1960. We got rid of our blasphemy laws in 2008. The British Board of Film Classification now okays the cinematic release [...]
A Machine of Paranoia: How Concerns for Student Safety May Chill Speech
NCAC has proudly signed onto the list of 13 Necessary and Proportionate principles, part of a global effort led by our friends at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, on mass surveillance. This week marks the one-year anniversary of the drafting of the principles. The list of principles proposes a set of guidelines that governments around the world should adhere to if [...]
Pennsylvania Teen Criminally Charged for Naughty Facebook Pictures with Jesus Sculpture
Is symbolic behavior a crime when it may offend religious sensitivities? A 14-year-old boy could be facing up to two years in juvenile detention for posting lewd, crass, yet ultimately innocuous photos on Facebook this past July. The problem: the photos featured him suggestively posing with a sculpture of Jesus. While traipsing the lawn of a local religious organization known [...]
Acts of Fear: Compromising the Digital Rights of Youth
I joined NCAC on the first day of the ninth Internet Governance Forum (IGF), which took place in Istanbul last week. Central to IGF – an event mired in controversy, given Turkey’s startlingly abusive Internet controls – was the topic of youth digital rights. Turkish academic Kursat Cagiltay commented that 42% of Turkish youth condoned government censorship of the Internet. He [...]
NCAC co-signs letter to President Obama and Members of the PCLOB
The undersigned organizations, former government officials, and members of Congress write to express their concerns over the US government's surveillance activities conducted under the authority of Executive Order 12333. NCAC shares the concerns of many that these surveillance activities will "undermine the fundamental rights of internet users everywhere" by implementing an unnecessary assemblage of users' personal information. The letter calls [...]
Tell the FCC to Defend Net Neutrality!
You still have time to add your voice to the FCC's general comment period on Net Neutrality! Hundreds of thousands of concerned netizens have submitted comments so far, but there's still something missing: You! The Electronic Frontier Foundation has provided an easy, online form at DearFCC.org to add your comment in favor of a neutral Internet. You can also comment [...]
EFF Debunks NSA Mass Surveillance Apologists
Free Expression Network member EFF have posted "The Top 5 Claims That Defenders of the NSA Have to Stop Making to Remain Credible" and it's a scathing takedown of anyone relying on these old chestnuts to prop up an argument for continued mass surveillance.
Spread the Word: It’s 404 Day!
Blog and post to your tumblr, Twitter and Facebook and then join the live, digital teach-in with NCAC, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and MIT's Center For Civic Media at 3pm ET to learn more about what you can do to help stop internet censorship in libraries and schools.
Help Fight Internet Censorship and Filtering in Libraries on 404 Day
Mark your calendars! On April 4th NCAC will be celebrating 404 Day, a day dedicated to the issue of internet censorship in public schools and libraries. Along with 404 Day partners the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the MIT Center for Civic Media, we are spreading the word and calling on You to share your stories!
EFF Statement on Dismissal of 11 Charges Against Barrett Brown
The U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas today filed a motion to dismiss 11 charges against Barrett Brown in a criminal prosecution that would have had massive implications for journalism and the right of ordinary people to share links. EF...
Vermont legislation would “refuse material support” for NSA mass data collection
Similar legislation has been introduced in 12 states. From Truthout.org: On Tuesday, January 28th, a transpartisan group of four Vermont state representatives introduced legislation that would block some of the practical effects of mass data collection by the National Security Agency (NSA). Rep. Teo Zagar (D-Windsor-4-1), along with co-sponsor Reps. Susan Davis (P/D-Orange-1), Patricia Komline (R-Bennington-Rutland) and William Stevens (I-Addison-Rutland) [...]
NSA’s collection of metadata “should end,” according to new report
Responses to recent disclosures about official surveillance of private communications and activities are rolling in. The most recent is from the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, which today released a Report on the Telephone Records Program Conducted under Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act and on the Operations of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The PCLOB is an independent [...]
Court of Appeals Ruling Kills Net Neutrality
In a 2-1 ruling today, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals effectively ended net neutrality, striking down the Federal Communications Commission’s Open Internet Order. The FCC's order was intended to keep broadband providers from interfering with traffic on the Web. The issue of who should regulate internet access has been the subject of much debate in the last decade. NCAC believes net neutrality allows [...]
NCAC joins 53 other organizations to oppose the FISA “Improvements” Act – Add your voice today!
Fifty-four civil liberties and public interest groups sent a letter to Congressional leadership today opposing S. 1631, the FISA Improvements Act. The bill, promoted by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), seeks to legalize and extend NSA mass surveillance programs, including the classified phone records surveillance program confirmed by documents released by Edward Snowden this summer. From EFF’s blog post on the [...]
NCAC and Coalition Members File Briefs Defending Student Speech
On Monday, NCAC joined with other organizations on an friend of the court brief (.pdf) to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in Barnes v. Zaccari, an important case involving the speech rights of college students. The case began in 2007, when Hayden Barnes was expelled from Valdosta State University in Georgia over his vocal criticism of [...]
NCAC’s Letter to Key Senators About S. 1619
April 8, 1998 The following letter was sent to the members of the Senate Commerce Committee and other key senators. The complete list of recipients follows the text. I am writing to express concern about legislative efforts to restrict access to the Internet in schools and libraries, and particularly about S. 1619, the Internet School Filtering Act, which would [...]
Jailed for a Facebook post: 19-Year-Old Justin Carter, State Sensitivity and the Half-Million-Dollar Bail
Justin Carter, 19, was jailed for a Facebook comment Have you ever lost your temper and said something in the heat of the moment you later came to regret? Did you end up waiting 5 months in jail for a trial because your family couldn’t make your half million dollar bail? That’s exactly what Justin Carter’s family and [...]
For Free Expression, Privacy is a Must
The nation is abuzz this week following Edward Snowden’s leaks about the NSA’s comprehensive (and fully unconstitutional) surveillance program (Click here for the Guardian’s live feed of Snowden-related news). Those of us who spend our time protecting civil liberties are appalled at the behavior of this administration and its intelligence and security agencies, and perhaps even more disturbed by the rhetoric [...]
Wrestling with internet hate speech
In the coming weeks we will be featuring posts from our smart and savvy summer interns. This post is by programs intern Eli Siems. Eli is a recent graduate of SUNY New Paltz with a degree in English. He is passionate about literature in all forms, particularly poetry, and his love of letters has led him to join the fight to protect [...]
So You Heard About the SAGA/Apple/ComiXology Flap, and You Want to Know More About Digital Gatekeepers?
We can help with that! NCAC is concerned with censorship in all its forms, even those instances where private enterprises are within their legal rights to marginalize or ban content based on a point of view. Users engage with the Internet as a democratizing public square but, in reality, most of the online channels we rely on are controlled by [...]
Censorship, Kids and the Internet
One part the internet, one part kids... mix and the result is a recipe for parental anxiety, mixed opinions from professionals and politicians, and overreaching attempts to control access to information. (See: Harlem Shake meme) This week the ACLU of Rhode Island released a report, "Access Denied," showing that the use of internet filtering software is pervasive in R.I. schools and [...]
Today is World Day Against Cyber Censorship
Organized by Reporters Without Borders, World Day Against Cyber Censorship pays tribute to the fight for internet freedom and to the citizens who have been arrested, harassed or affected in some way by government attempts to control information. Learn more about internet censorship and which countries are doing the most damage here.
Rather than Censor Video Games, NJ Library Censors Everything
Early in February, we wrote a letter in response to reports that the public library in Paterson, NJ had banned the playing of video games on their public computers. While the policy was conceived with children in mind, it ostensibly applied to anyone. Despite reports to the contrary, as soon as we sent them a stern letter, the library back-pedaled, claiming [...]
NY State Anti-Cyberbullying Bill Jeopardizes First Amendment-Protected Student Speech
The effort in New York State to combat bullying in schools is "deeply flawed", according to the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), which has urged New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo not to sign the recently passed S.7740/A.I0712 bill into law. In a letter sent after the announcement of the bill's passage, NCAC praised the goals of the bill but warned of language so vague and overbroad that it "will likely create more problems than it solves."
PayPal Lifts Ban on Erotic Books
PayPal, the dominant processor of Internet payments, retracted its threat (Reuters) to close the accounts of online booksellers who sell works that include descriptions of rape, incest and bestiality.
NCAC, ABFFE Protest PayPal Ban on Erotic Material
The company’s threat to close the accounts of online booksellers who sell works that include descriptions of rape, incest and bestiality would have a chilling effect on the sale of books that adults have a legal right to buy
The Privacy Network
As Facebook continues to dominate the social media sphere, new competitors emerge to challenge the weaknesses apparent in its design. One of the most recent of this breed is the social networking site Pidder. Drawing on fears of data-mining and even “social media background checks”, Pidder focuses on privacy protection to a user-unfriendly extreme. After using Pidder we concluded [...]
ICAN(N) Censor
In late June the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the international body that oversees the Internet address system, announced that it approved new generic top-level domain names (gTLDs). There are currently 22 general top-level domain names (.com, .org, .net, etc.), however this vote means that there will be an indefinite number. One of the myths [...]
Student Speech Online: Can or Should Schools Punish It?
The U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that two students who both created fake MySpace profiles parodying their school principals had been unfairly disciplined by their respective school districts.
Student Speech Online: Can/Should Schools Punish It?
On Monday, June 13th 2011, the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that two students who both created fake MySpace profiles parodying their school principals had been unfairly disciplined by their respective school districts. In both cases, the Court found that the schools had not shown that the students’ actions were sufficiently disruptive of school activities to justify disciplinary [...]
Chilling Effects on Social Media
Social media has reached a level of pervasiveness that cannot be ignored - and corporations are paying very close attention. Earlier this year, Goldman Sachs received flak for banning Facebook at work while investing $450 million in the company. Perceived hypocrisy may have played a role, but acknowledging the chilling effect that corporate 'social media policies' have on free speech is another [...]
Protect IP Act Raises First Amendment Concerns
Senator Patrick Leahy (VT) has introduced the Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act of 2011 (PROTECT IP) to replace last year’s failed Combating Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA). Supposedly a new and improved version of COICA, the PROTECT IP act is aimed at denying access to "pirate" or "rogue" websites "dedicated to infringing activities,” [...]