[liberationtech] Twitter May Censor Tweets in Individual Countries

[Jillian C. York]

With all due respect, Kate, it's not that simple.

First off, the UDHR does not stand alone. The International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights provides that:

"The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article
carries with it special duties and responsibilities. It may therefore be
subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are
provided by law and are necessary:

   - for respect of the rights or reputations of others;


   - for the protection of national security or of public order (ordre
   public), or of public health or morals."


As laid out last year by the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression
Frank LaRue, any limitation to free expression must pass the following
tests:

(a)    It must be provided by law, which is clear and accessible to
everyone (principles of predictability and transparency); and
(b)    It must pursue one of the purposes set out in article 19, paragraph
3, of the Covenant, namely (i) to protect the rights or reputations of
others, or (ii) to protect national security or of public order, or of
public health or morals (principle of legitimacy); and
(c)    It must be proven as necessary and the least restrictive means
required to achieve the purported aim (principles of necessity and
proportionality).


Assuming Twitter is to respond only to legitimate requests as laid out
above, they are not--as you claim--violating human rights.

I wish protections on free expression were stronger, but the sensationalism
I see emanating from this list--as well as the media--is just not helpful.

-Jillian

On Fri, Jan 27, 2012 at 9:21 AM, Kate Krauss <kate at aidspolicyproject.org>wrote:

> Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. The Universal Declaration of Human
> Rights (1948, applies to all countries), says this:
>
>
> Article 19.
>        • Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this
> right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek,
> receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless
> of frontiers.
>
> http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/
>
> These are not arbitrary standards. What Twitter is planning to do is a
> human rights violation.  It's no different than if they went into other
> countries to censor the newspapers.
>
>
> Kate Krauss
> Executive Director,
> The AIDS Policy Project
>
> On Jan 27, 2012, at 8:54 AM, frankltd at fastmail.co.uk wrote:
>
> > However, will Twitter country specific censorship be as transparent as
> > being able cross check with take down notices such as these:
> > https://www.chillingeffects.org/dmca512c/notice.cgi ?
> >
> > Frank
> >
> > ----- Original message -----
> > From: "Marc" <marc at let.de>
> > To: liberationtech at lists.stanford.edu
> > Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2012 14:44:32 +0100
> > Subject: Re: [liberationtech] Twitter May Censor Tweets in Individual
> > Countries
> >
> > They are trying to solve the problem of content that is illegal in some
> >> places, but not
> >> in others. As far as I understand, previously, they removed such content
> >> completely. Now, they can at least pretend not to display it in certain
> >> countries and keep it up in others
> >
> >
> > I think this is an infinite loop
> >
> > https://projects.eff.org/~barlow/Declaration-Final.html
> >
> >
> > :(
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