The Juthamas scandal: Is the U.S. trying to manage Thailand’s elections?
CJ Hinke, Freedom Against Censorship Thailand (FACT)
A $1.7 million bribery scandal involving former Tourism Authority of Thailand Governor, Juthamas Siriwan, broke this week with the arrest of two Americans. Juthamas was also Deputy Leader of the Puea Pandin Party, a post which she has now resigned.
Juthamas was a top-level bureaucrat at TAT before becoming its Governor from 2002 to 2006. Tourism is a large component of the Thai economy and TAT has one of the largest non-military budgets in government. Obviously, anyone associated with managing Thailand’s tourist economy wields great power. Read the rest of this entry »
Schneir on cyberwar-Cryptogram
16-11-07
[CJ Hinke of FACT comments: Some of the points raised in this article are the very reasons our Computer-Related Crimes Act was passed into law. One can only be horrified that any government considers cyberwar against its own citizens. Internet censorship is only the most visible aspect of this. Government insists that we should be afraid. This makes Thailand, and the world, more insecure rather than giving us security.] CyberwarBruce Schneir, Cryptogram/Counterpane SecurityThe first problem with any discussion about cyberwar is definitional. I’ve been reading about cyberwar for years now, and there seem to be as many definitions of the term as there are people who write about the topic.Some people try to limit cyberwar to military actions taken during wartime, while others are so inclusive that they include the script kiddies who deface websites for fun. I think the restrictive definition is more useful Read the rest of this entry »
[CJ Hinke of FACT comments: Studs Terkel is an elder statesman of American oral history. He's been there, done that. Do we dare to be blacklisted by government like the "Communists" of 1976?
How far are we really willing to go to speak out for freedom? Labour unions, politics, petitions. It's incredible how many progressive Thais just won't sign FACT's petition. FACT is "too radical".
I don't think so. I don't think there's radical enough a citizen can do to resist the unjust actions of their government. Don't you believe in the future? Aren't you a hero?]
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
The Wiretap This Time
Studs Terkel
The New York Times: October 29, 2007
EARLIER this month, the Senate Intelligence Committee and the White House agreed to allow the executive branch to conduct dragnet interceptions of the electronic communications of people in the United States. They also agreed to “immunize” American telephone companies from lawsuits charging that after 9/11 some companies collaborated with the government to violate the Constitution and existing federal law. I am a plaintiff in one of those lawsuits, and I hope Congress thinks carefully before denying me, and millions of other Americans, our day in court.
During my lifetime, there has been a sea change in the way that politically active Americans view their relationship with government. In 1920, during my youth, I recall the Palmer raids in which more than 10,000 people were rounded up, most because they were members of particular labor unions or belonged to groups that advocated change in American domestic or foreign policy.
Unrestrained surveillance was used to further the investigations leading to these detentions, and the Bureau of Investigation — the forerunner to the F.B.I. — eventually created a database on the activities of individuals. This activity continued through the Red Scare of the period. Read the rest of this entry »
[CJ Hinke of FACT comments: Some FACT readers may well have found our comments about the destruction of the Buddhas at Bamiyan a mental stretch. This article will prove even moreso. The fight against censorship is seeing the world in its political and human aspects. What does 'freedom' really mean?
The "war on terror" has replaced private political terrorism with state terrorism. Make no mistake, state terrorism has always been with us, just not as blatant!
The rest of the world may be talking about the non-issue of nukes in Iran. For us in Thailand, there is an issue of real and human importance happening right now: the continuing violence in the Muslim South.
The Thai Muslims I know are Thais first and Muslims second. I have never met a Thai Muslim who does not love the King.
FACT is politically non-partisan, as am I personally, but I view with great hope a Muslim challenge to the Democrat Party by real Southerners, Puea Pandin Party organised by acquitted Jamaah Islamiya suspect, Waemahadi Waedaoh. Puea Pandin promises to stop the senseless and useless Southern violence. The very fact that the government tried Waemahadi gives me great hope in his integrity.
I hope Southern Thais give them a chance. We don't have any other solution.]
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Fearing Fear Itself
Paul Krugman
The New York Times: October 29, 2007
In America’s darkest hour, Franklin Delano Roosevelt urged the nation not to succumb to “nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror.” But that was then. Read the rest of this entry »
[CJ Hinke of FACT comments: In my view, this man is a cyberterrorist. Despite our repugnance at pornography, hate speech, defamation, terrorism, these are real opinions by real people who deserve a voice. Call it the price a society pays for free expression. The real issue is who gets to decide what these 'crimes' are. We must not make free expression on the Internet different from freedom of expression in real life. Only when these crimes are put into practice, may we make use of satisfactory existing law to punish them. Incidentally, Shahda seems to be a purfeyor of another sort olf dangerous disinformation: the connection of Iraq's Saddam to 9/11. Yes, even Shahda deserves a forum! See article following specific to Thailand.]
What to Do About Pixels of Hate
Jodi Hilton
The New York Times: October 21, 2007
NOT WAITING FOR GOVERNMENT Joseph G. Shahda is waging a private war on militant Web sites.
ONE by one, starting a few weeks ago, 40 militant Islamist Web sites got knocked off the Internet. Gone were some of the world’s most active jihadi sites, with forums full of extremist chatter.
This disappearance mystified American counterterrorism officials. They hadn’t shut them down, they knew, so who had?
Happily claiming credit for the jihadi blackout is a Christian-Lebanese engineer named Joseph G. Shahda, who is waging a private, and passionate, war on terrorism from his home near Boston. Read the rest of this entry »
[FACT comments: Censorship may be judged purely by political will, not by volume. Thai citizens are, in fact, in a far more dangerous situation regarding access to information--the Computer-Related Crimes Act criminalises computer users for far more 'crimes' than does China. Thai users can be criminally charged for accessing any illegal content on the Internet. Read the complete report here. RSF's complete China report follows this article. We have also reviewed a second research report on Chinese censorship for comparison, available only in French: http://www.frstrategie.org/barreFRS/publications/rd/RD_20070126.pdf]
A “Journey to the Heart of Internet censorship” on eve of party congress
Reporters Without Borders
In partnership with Reporters Without Borders and Chinese Human Rights Defenders, a Chinese Internet expert working in IT industry has produced an exclusive study on the key mechanism of the Chinese official system of online censorship, surveillance and propaganda. The author prefers to remain anonymous.
On the eve of the 17th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which opens this week in Beijing, Reporters Without Borders and the Chinese Human Rights Defenders call on the government to allow the Chinese to exercise their rights to freedom of press, expression and information. “This system of censorship is unparalleled anywhere in the world and is an insult to the spirit of online freedom,” the two organisations said. “With less than a year to go before the Beijing Olympics, there is an urgent need for the government to stop blocking thousands of websites, censoring online news and imprisoning Internet activists.”
[FACT comments: with a quote from the final paragraph, "Some people say [censorware] is ineffective because dissidents can get around it,” says Seth Finkelstein, a programmer and anticensorship activist. “I say political control doesn’t have to be 100 percent to be effective. Controlling the ability of the vast majority of the population to see outside information is still very effective for the goals of the totalitarian regime.” It has happened here.]
When US-made ‘censorware’ ends up in iron fists
Despite Burma’s record of repression, it’s probably legal for American companies to sell Internet filters there, export lawyers say. But is it ethical?
By Ben Arnoldy
The Christian Science Monitor, October 19, 2007
Oakland, Calif. During Burma’s short-lived uprising late last month, young dissidents risked their lives to smuggle news of their peaceful protest to the outside world. They may have been up against Internet censorship software designed in America, if a connection found to exist in 2005 still holds.
Moreover, if a US firm wanted to sell Internet filters to Burma (Myanmar) today, despite several layers of economic sanctions against the government there, it would probably be legal to do so, say export lawyers.
Absence of federal regulation has allowed so-called censorware of at least four California companies to end up in the hands of foreign governments shown to block citizens’ access to political, religious, and other websites. Read the rest of this entry »
[FACT comments: Simply shutting down the Internet can be accomplished by any insecure government anywhere. It can happen here! See earlier article, “Burma cyber-dissidents crack censorship”
Myanmar Junta Unplugs Internet
BANGKOK, Oct. 3 — It was about as simple and uncomplicated as shooting demonstrators in the streets. Embarrassed by smuggled video and photographs that showed their people rising up against them, the generals who run Myanmar simply switched off the Internet.
Until Friday television screens and newspapers abroad were flooded with scenes of tens of thousands of red-robed monks in the streets and of chaos and violence as the junta stamped out the biggest popular uprising there in two decades.
But then the images, text messages and postings stopped, shut down by generals who belatedly grasped the power of the Internet to jeopardize their crackdown.
“Finally they realized that this was their biggest enemy, and they took it down,” said Aung Zaw, editor of an exile magazine based in Thailand called The Irrawaddy, whose Web site has been a leading source of information in recent weeks. The site has been attacked by a virus whose timing raises the possibility that the military government has a few skilled hackers in its ranks. Read the rest of this entry »
A year after Thai coup, press freedom remains compromised and vulnerable
Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA), 17 September 2007
One year after the coup in Thailand, a new Constitution is in place,
elections are on the horizon and Thais are looking forward to
normalising the overall political climate in the Kingdom. The media
and free expression environment, however, remains compromised, with
martial law, lèse-majesté rules, and new and proposed laws governing
the Internet and national security concerns keeping the media footing
problematic in the foreseeable future. Read the rest of this entry »
เว็บกฎหมายประกาศปิดตัว หลังเจอข้อหา “หมิ่นศาล”
โดย : ประชาไท วันที่ : 13/9/2550
อุดม แซ่อึ้ง ผู้ดูแลเว็บ www.thaijustice.com ตัดสินใจปิดเว็บไซต์เป็นการถาวร หลังกองปราบส่งหนังสือถึงผู้ให้บริการทางอินเตอร์เน็ตว่า บุคคลผู้ดูแลเว็บดังกล่าว อาจมีความผิดฐานดูหมิ่นศาล
หลังจากที่จิราวรรณ สุญาณวนิชกุล อธิบดีผู้พิพากษาศาลอาญา เข้าร้องทุกข์กล่าวโทษต่อกองบังคับการปราบปราม เมื่อวันที่ 5 ก.ค. 50 ให้ดำเนินคดีกับผู้ส่งข้อความบุคคล ซึ่งเป็นเว็บมาสเตอร์ที่ทำหน้าที่ในฐานะบรรณาธิการเว็บ รวมทั้งเป็นผู้ควบคุมดูแลเว็บ www.thaijustice.com โดยกล่าวหาว่าเป็นตัวการ ผู้ใช้ ผู้สนับสนุน ในความผิดฐานดูหมิ่นศาล
ทำให้เมื่อวันที่ 6 ก.ย. ที่ผ่านมา พันตำรวจเอกวิษณุ ม่วงแพรศี รองผู้กำกับการปฏิบัติราชการแทน ผู้บังคับการปราบปราม ทำหนังสือถึงบริษัทอินเตอร์เน็ท โซลูชั่น แอนด์ เซอร์วิส โพรวายเดอร์ จำกัด ว่าขอตรวจสอบข้อมูลการใช้อินเตอร์เน็ทของผู้ที่เป็นเจ้าของและผู้ดูแลเว็บไซต์ www.thaijustice.com พร้อมทั้งขอประวัติ ชื่อ ที่อยู่ รวมไปถึงรายละเอียดการใช้บริการของหมายเลข IP ของผู้ใช้บริการดังกล่าว
ล่าสุด ประชาไทพบเมื่อวันที่ 12 ก.ย. ที่ผ่านมา อุดม แซ่อึ้ง ผู้ดูแลเว็บ www.thaijustice.com ตัดสินใจปิดเว็บไซต์เป็นการถาวร พร้อมทั้งระบุในเว็บไซต์ว่า ขอชี้แจงว่ามิได้มีส่วนรู้เห็นหรือเกี่ยวข้องใดๆ ทั้งสิ้น
