Reports Claim That Pakistan Is Trying To Ban Encryption Under Telco Law

from the yvxr-gung-jvyy-jbex dept

As various governments have tried to clamp down, censor and/or filter the internet, all it's really done is increase interest and usage of encryption tools such as VPNs. Every so often we have commenters who insist that outlawing encryption is the obvious next step for governments, though that suggests an ignorance of the practical impossibility of truly banning encryption -- which, after all, is really just a form of speech. The US, of course, famously toyed with trying to block the export of PGP in the 90s, but finally realized that it would likely lose big time in a court battle. While I could certainly see some politicians here trying to ban certain forms of encryption, I couldn't see any such effort being successful long term.

In other countries, however, they seem ready to make a go of it. Privacy International is reporting that Pakistan is trying to ban the use of encryption, including for VPNs, as part of the implementation of a new telco law (pdf) which requires telcos to spy on their customers. Obviously, encryption makes that tougher, so the response is just to ban it entirely.

But here's the big question: can any such ban really be effective? I mean, if you and I agree on using a simple cipher between us, that's "encryption," but is indistinguishable from "speech" in most contexts. That means any such ban on encryption is effectively and practically useless the moment it goes into effect. There will always be incredibly simple ways around it. Trying to ban encryption is like trying to ban language. You can't reasonably do it.

Filed Under: encryption, pakistan

Pakistan Hasn't Banned Facebook Yet... But It Might Soon

from the overreact-much? dept

Last year, we reported on an attempt to ban Facebook throughout all of Pakistan, due to a group on the site that some Muslims found offensive (the group was supporting an "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!" following a controversy on that subject). It seemed positively silly to ban an entire site based on how one small group of people used that site, but we've seen it happen in a number of countries. Apparently there was a ruling on this that was made back in February, but was just released, which, while sympathetic to the idea of banning Facebook, decided not to issue the ban. Of course, the EFF report on this also notes that a new petition to ban Facebook is going to be heard later this week anyway, so there will be yet another chance to completely block the site due to how a few folks used it. That original post from last year got a bunch of comments from Pakistan defending the idea of blocking Facebook, but I'm still at a loss to see how it makes sense to block an entire site over a single particular use.

Filed Under: blocks, pakistan
Companies: facebook

Will The Journalists Who Outed CIA's Pakistan Chief Be Treated Like Julian Assange?

from the questions,-questions dept

Richard Kulawiec pointed us to the news that got a lot of attention last week concerning how the CIA had recalled its chief in Pakistan back to the US after his name was outed in a lawsuit. The lawsuit was filed by a guy who blames the CIA for his relatives being killed in a drone attack. Apparently, two Pakistani journalists gave him the name of the CIA chief, and the guy included it in his lawsuit, leading to the recall. While the American press is not reporting the guy's name, it's widely available in foreign coverage.

That said, Richard asks a key question: given how many people have complained that Julian Assange should face trial/imprisonment/death etc. for his work with Wikileaks -- which it's been claimed, with little proof, has actually put Americans in danger -- why are we not seeing the same sort of claims about the Pakistani journalists who put this CIA boss in danger? After all, the situations are similar. In both cases, these are non-Americans who had certain information, which they revealed. Except, in the case of Assange and Wikileaks, there's actually been an ongoing effort to redact names and keep important details like that secret. That didn't happen with the Pakistani journalists and the CIA chief. So why is one so evil, and the others mostly being ignored?

Filed Under: cia, intelligence, outing, pakistan, wikileaks
Companies: wikileaks

Russian Press And Pakistani Courts Apparently Have More Respect For Free Speech Than Joe Lieberman

from the time-to-resign,-joe dept

We've already discussed how the US is, quite clearly, trying to censor various information despite its claims of being anti-censorship and it's efforts to pressure foreign countries to stop censorship of things like the internet. Yet here are two interesting stories, concerning the Wikileaks situation, suggesting that two countries, which are not exactly known for being bastions of free speech, appear to be a lot more open to it than certain US politicians.

The first, via Glyn Moody is a long and interesting opinion piece in Pravda, of all places, pointing out the hypocrisy of the US government's response to Wikileaks and comparing it to the government's response to the release of Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent. It also runs through a nice history of the US's back-and-forth battle with free speech issues, such as with the Alien & Sedition Acts and the McCarthy era. It also highlights how the Wikileaks' release shows evidence of the US government covering up all sorts of politically motivated acts. The conclusion is dead on:

It is the American people who should be outraged that its government has transformed a nation with a reputation for freedom, justice, tolerance and respect for human rights into a backwater that revels in its criminality, cover-ups, injustices and hypocrisies.

It's pretty sad when Pravda is lecturing the US on free speech, tolerance and respect for human rights.

Then we move over to Pakistan, where the country's High Court has dismissed an attempt to get Wikileaks banned from that country. Someone had petitioned the court, saying that the latest leaks could "create a rift among Pakistan" and other countries. However, the court dismissed it with the judge saying: "We must bear the truth, no matter how harmful it is."

And yet, here in the US, we have Senator Joe Lieberman running around trying to shove truth back into the hole he in which wishes it were buried. A very sad statement on the state of US respect for free speech.

Filed Under: free speech, joe lieberman, pakistan, pravda, russia, wikileaks
Companies: wikileaks

Pakistan Orders Internet Ban On Google, Yahoo, Bing, Hotmail, YouTube, Amazon & MSN

from the have-fun dept

Perhaps Pakistan should just turn off its internet connection? We've already had stories recently about how courts have ordered that both Facebook and YouTube be blocked -- but supposedly both bans had been lifted. Then came the news that there were attempts to put Facebook's founders on trial, potentially for a death sentence, because some users had posted stuff people in Pakistan didn't like. The latest, sent in by Ali, is that a Pakistani court has ordered a whole bunch of popular websites be blocked from access. You may have heard of a few of these: Google, Yahoo, Bing, MSN, YouTube, Amazon and Hotmail. Who are they missing? Ebay? Twitter? I'm sure those will be blocked soon enough...

Filed Under: bing, blocks, hotmail, msn, pakistan
Companies: amazon, google, microsoft, yahoo, youtube

Pakistani Lawyer Apparently Seeks Death Penalty For Facebook Founders Because Of User Contest

from the overreact-much dept

You may recall that last month, a Pakistani court ordered that the entire site of Facebook be blocked from the country because a German woman using the site had created an "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!" page, in response to the recent "threats" against South Park's writers, concerning a recent episode of that show. We thought that was a bit extreme, though we got a surprising number of comments from people in Pakistan who strongly agreed with the ruling, and were rather quick with an insult for anyone who disagreed.

If you thought that was an overreaction, well, then you'll love the latest. Apparently a lawyer is petitioning the court for charges to be brought against three of Facebook's founders, Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes. Neither Dustin nor Chris have worked at the company in quite some time. Apparently, the charges could lead to a death penalty request. According to the law:

"Use of derogatory remark etc, in respect of the Holy Prophet, whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable for fine."

I do like how after you are dead, you are then also liable for a fine. Pakistani law enforcement is apparently investigating the "crime," but no charges have yet been filed. However, the lawyer is confident that Zuckerberg and his two former partners will soon be arrested and shipped to Pakistan. I would have to imagine that's not actually going to happen any time soon.

Filed Under: blocks, chris hughes, death penalty, dustin moskovitz, mark zuckerberg, pakistan
Companies: facebook

And Now Pakistan Bans YouTube Again... Let's Hope It Doesn't Take Down Half The Internet This Time

from the maybe-don't-visit-sites-you-don't-like dept

So, just yesterday we wrote about Pakistan's decision to block all of Facebook, because some users had set up a page for "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!" (in response to the threats made to Comedy Central concerning an episode of South Park). Originally, just that one page had been banned, but apparently that wasn't enough, and a court ordered the entire site should be banned for allowing that sort of content to appear. In response, I asked if Pakistan would ban the internet if a page was put up advocating the same thing. It looks like the country may be trying to ban services one-by-one.

Now it's been announced that Pakistan is blocking access to YouTube over the same issue. Of course, Pakistan tried to block YouTube a few years ago, and it ended up taking down a large chunk of the internet -- so hopefully this time they've come up with a more sophisticated way of doing this. In the meantime, though, I'm still at a loss for how completely banning a site makes sense here, but it appears my original post somehow is being spread around Pakistan, because starting not so long ago there was a sudden rush of comments coming from people in Pakistan, defending the blocking decisions. Given that, how long until Techdirt gets blocked as well?

Filed Under: blocks, pakistan
Companies: youtube

Pakistani Court Orders All Of Facebook To Be Blocked Over Page It Doesn't Like

from the sledge-hammer dept

Remember back in 2008, when Pakistan ordered YouTube to be blocked and took down a chunk of the wider internet outside of Pakistan in the process? One hopes they've got the technical details worked out this time, because Mr. LemurBoy alerts us to the news that the Pakistani High Court is so disturbed by the fact that there's an "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!" page (hopefully you've already heard why that's controversial...) on Facebook that it has ordered all of Facebook to be blocked through the end of May. Originally, only that specific page had been ordered to be blocked, but apparently that wasn't enough:

Lawyers with the Islamic Lawyers Forum appealed to the higher court on Wednesday, saying the entire site should be blocked because it had allowed the page to be posted in the first place

Of course, that makes me wonder. If someone created a similar webpage just "on the internet," would Pakistan order that all of the internet should be blocked? If it was on a piece of paper, would all paper be blocked from import?

Filed Under: blocks, pakistan
Companies: facebook

More Examples Of Patent Incentives Making The World Less Safe

from the hoarding-the-info-needed-to-save-us dept

For years, we've written about how Indonesia has been hoarding bird flu samples and refusing to share them with researchers, because they're afraid that someone will come in and patent the cure, based on the samples they provide, and that will make it much costlier to Indonesia to get the vaccine. Of course, the end result instead might be no vaccine at all... It looks like we may be facing a similar issue with Ug99, a fungus that is aggressively killing wheat crops in Africa and the Middle East -- potentially having a massive impact on global food supplies. FormerAC alerts us to an article about the fight against Ug99, where it's noted that Pakistan won't share some important samples with the rest of the world, again out of fear that some big company will patent what they find:

As the breeders keep tinkering, South Asia is bracing for impact. The CDL recently tried to get its hands on a suspicious P. graminis sample from Pakistan that is said to knock out Sr31. But the country is reluctant to share: "Some countries regard isolates of their pathogens as part of their genetic heritage," CDL director Marty Carson says. "I guess there's a fear that we'll patent something off of it."

Well, given Monsanto's history of patenting disease resistant crops -- and then over-aggressively attacking anyone who uses such crops (even accidentally), it would seem like a rather legitimate fear. Perhaps, rather than brushing this fear off, the USDA's Cereal Disease Laboratory (CDL) should work to do something to fix things?

Filed Under: cdl, indonesia, intellectual property, monsanto, pakistan, patent
Companies: monsanto, usda

Thin Skin: SMS Political Jokes In Pakistan Can Get You 14 Years In Jail

from the can't-take-a-joke? dept

It would appear that the typical late-night TV comedian in the US would face serious jailtime in Pakistan, were he based there. MK alerts us that President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan is so annoyed by people passing around jokes about him via SMS that the gov't has started threatening to charge people for passing around such jokes, as "slandering the political leadership of the country" under a vaguely worded Cyber Crimes law, that could lead to 14 years in jail. It seems that should only lead to more jokes. How does one get to be a political leader with such a thin skin?

Filed Under: criminal, jokes, pakistan, sms