Thailand Demands More Proxy Censorship From Facebook

from the negotiating-with-censors-rarely-goes-well dept

More foreign censorship is coming to American social media companies. Back in January, Facebook hinted it would be at least partially receptive to the government of Thailand's desire to be free from criticism. Fortunately, the Thailand government has been slightly more rational than, say, Austria's by not demanding offending content be removed everywhere. So far, it seems amenable to Facebook just preventing Thailand's citizens from seeing anything deemed insulting to their rulers (dead or alive).

The problem right now (at least in the minds of Thailand government officials) is that Facebook isn't making with the targeted censorship quickly enough.

The social media giant has been given until next Tuesday to remove more than 130 items from pages viewable in Thailand.

Facebook says it does consider requests from governments to block material, and will comply if it breaks local laws.

The "or else" part of the government's threat seems to be nonexistent at this point, although it probably involves cutting off citizens' access to Facebook entirely. The Thai government insists Facebook has been mostly cooperative, but is dragging its feet on the 100+ posts it has declared illegal under the country's "don't badmouth your authoritarian leaders" law.

It's disappointing to see Facebook agree, even partially, to act as a proxy censor for Thailand's government. While it's generally a good idea for social media companies to be somewhat responsive to local rules and regulations, there's very little to be gained by being an errand boy for a regime where insulting kings results in secret trials and 15-year jail sentences.

It must be noted that Facebook isn't the only US tech company working with the Thailand government to ensure its top officials remain unoffended. Google has also participated in proxy censorship. Last year, it reported it had complied with 85% of requests made under Thailand's lese majeste laws, although it did not explain whether this was location-based blocking or complete removal of the literally-offending posts.

Any form of tolerance for this only encourages further abuse. The country's cybersecurity laws are already being abused by the government, which has declared that merely communicating with foreign critics online violates the Computer Crime Act. Censors' requests for inches quickly stretch into miles. If either of these companies tries to reel in some of the censorious slack they've given Thailand's government, it will most likely be greeted with a complete blockade or ban of their services and sites. If that's going to be the inevitable result, why bother humoring these requests at all?

Filed Under: censorship, lese majeste, social media, thailand
Companies: facebook

Thai Government Forbids Any Online Contact With Three Overseas Critics Of The Monarchy

from the yeah,-that'll-work dept

As long-time Techdirt readers will know, Thailand does love it some lèse-majesté punishments. The country's lèse-majesté law -- literally "injured majesty" -- is used to protect Thailand's monarch from any kind of insult, however slight. It's been applied time and again over the years -- we first wrote about it back in 2007. In the past, the Thai government has done all the obvious things like demanding that local ISPs block sites, snooping on its citizens to find out who might be disrespecting the king, and threatening to throw even foreigners in prison for a very long time. But its latest move on the lèse-majesté front is rather a bold one: it has forbidden its citizens from having any online contact with three critics of the Thai monarchy and government. As the Guardian reports:

A letter from the [Thai] digital economy and society ministry warned citizens that engaging on the internet with the Thai academics Somsak Jeamteerasakul and Pavin Chachavalpongpun as well as the journalist Andrew MacGregor Marshall could violate the law.

All three live in outside Thailand but have large online followings in the country for their commentary about the failings of both the junta and the monarchy.

The ministry statement said citizens should not follow, contact or share content from the trio on the internet or social media. The letter added that people who disseminate their information, directly or indirectly, could be violating the country’s Computer Crime Act.

The three people concerned are only able to voice their criticisms of the monarchy and government because they live outside the country -- it would obviously be far too risky to do the same inside it. So this latest move is effectively an attempt to forbid Thai citizens from accessing "forbidden" material that lies beyond the Thai government's direct control, and which has proved impossible to block using technical means. It will doubtless be just as futile.

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Filed Under: andrew macgregor marshall, contact, criticism, free speech, lese majeste, pavin chachavalpongpun, social media, somsak jeamteerasakul, thailand

Thai Government Demands Popular Chat App Reveal Any Time Any User Insults The King

from the encrypted-chats-are-important dept

I spent some time in Asia earlier this year, and while people in the US focus on Facebook Messenger, Snapchat, Google Hangouts and a variety of other chat apps, the chat app of choice over there was Line. Basically everyone used it. A year ago, Line moved towards true end-to-end encryption. Earlier this year, the company made end-to-end encrypted chats the default, rather than as a user option (Thank you Snowden!).

Good timing. The company has apparently now refused to obey a Thai government demand that it alert the government to anyone insulting the Thai royal family on the messaging app. For years, we've written about Thailand's ridiculous lese majeste laws, which make it a crime to insult the king. As we've noted, the law is used as a way to censor and crack down on political opponents. And, of course, with the death of the Thai king last month, there's been a sudden uptick in Thai officials going after people for supposed lese majeste violations.

But Line is telling the government that it just can't help out here.

"We do not monitor or block user content. User content is also encrypted, and cannot be viewed by LINE," the statement sent to DPA said.

Of course, there's been some controversy in the past over this. Back in 2014, Thailand announced that it was instituting a broad surveillance program to snoop on basically all internet communications for the sake of seeking out and punishing lese majeste violators. A few months later, Thai government officials flat out claimed that this included monitoring Line messages, something that the company flat out denied (though, that may have also inspired the move to encryption). While Thai officials have, at times, even claimed the ability to read encrypted messages, it seemed like that was just idle boasting, rather than a legitimate revelation of surveillance capabilities.

There is one oddity about Line's response to the Thai government, though:

"We ask the authorities seeking to obtain user data to make official requests through diplomatic channels and have so advised the Thai authorities," LINE added.

So, uh, if the messages are all end-to-end encrypted and there's no way for Line to access them to share with any government, why is it asking the Thai government to use diplomatic channels to make an official request?

Filed Under: chat, encryption, insults, king, lese majeste, messaging, thailand
Companies: line

Thai Gov't Accused Of Instituting Mass Internet Surveillance... To See If You're Reading Anything The King Doesn't Like

from the big-brother-with-a-chip-on-his-shoulder dept

There's been lots of talk about internet surveillance lately, for obvious reasons. Authoritarian regimes, like China and Iran, have been using it to stifle dissent. Western countries have been using it by claiming that it's to "stop terrorism" (though, the evidence shows that's mostly just a convenient excuse). So, really, it shouldn't be any surprise to see governments embracing internet surveillance for more and more ridiculous ideas. Over in Thailand, we've written about the country's ridiculous "lèse majesté" laws that make it a crime to "insult" the king. This has resulted in some crazy situations in Thailand, including having all of YouTube banned because of a single parody video, an entire chat site shut down because some people said some stuff the king didn't like, and a US citizen threatened with 15 years in jail over merely linking to an unauthorized biography of the king.

So, perhaps it shouldn't be that surprising that a Thai news organization is reporting that the government is now planning on using mass internet surveillance to make sure that no one is even reading anything that the king doesn't like, which would violate those lèse majesté laws.

Thai authorities reportedly planned to implement a surveillance device starting from 15 September to sniff out Thai Internet users, specifically targeting those producing and reading lèse majesté content, a report says.... One said the device targets keywords related to lèse majesté and that it is relatively powerful and could access all kinds of communication traffic on the internet. Another source said it could even monitor communications using secured protocols.

That last bit seems highly questionable. If done right, encryption would make that kind of surveillance nearly impossible, so the idea that whatever system they're using could actually do that should be taken skeptically. Of course, it could just be that the government is leaking these claims to lead people to self-censor in the belief that they are being watched, even if it's not true. And if that's the plan, it appears to already be working.

After learning about this, a national level Thai-language newspaper editorial team has reluctantly resorted to a policy of greater self-censorship. Its editor warned editorial staff not to browse any lèse majesté website at work and think twice before reporting any story related to lèse majesté.

Of course, as we noted earlier this year, the leaders of the recent Thai coup have already been big on censoring the internet, and a law passed back in May lets the government "monitor and access the computer traffic, the use of websites, social media, photos, text, video and audio... which are deemed unlawful" and further to "stop the dissemination" of any such website. It appears these latest rumors are just taking it up a notch.

Of course, the chilling effects and impact on free speech of even rumors of such a system should be frightening to anyone who believes in free speech and an open internet where people can discuss things freely.

Filed Under: chilling effects, free speech, internet surveillance, lese majeste, surveillance, thailand

US Citizen Facing 15 Years In Jail For Linking From His Blog To An Unauthorized Bio Of Thai King

from the goodbye-tourism dept

I'm curious if Thailand is purposely trying to kill off its rather lucrative tourism business. We've discussed in the past that Thailand has strict laws against "insulting" the king. These lèse majesté laws are used widely in Thailand to stop any sort of political criticism. They've been used to block entire sites including YouTube, and to arrest website owners for the comments on their site.

Lately, Thailand has been trying to use those laws against US citizens. Last month, we wrote about the case of Anthony Chai, a US citizen who had posted some anonymous comments critical of the king. In that case, the Canadian/US firm that hosted the site handed Chai's identity over to the Thai government without question, and Chai was arrested recently while visiting.

In a similar case, US citizen Joe Gordon had posted a link on his blog to an unauthorized bio of the king... and was then arrested when visiting Thailand, the news has come out that after months of denying the charges, Gordon has decided he can't take it any more and has agreed to plead guilty.

"I do not want to fight this case. I plead guilty to all the accusations," he told judges.

At this point, I'm not sure why any US citizen would ever agree to visit Thailand again. If you merely link to an unauthorized bio of the king, you could end up in jail. Furthermore, I'm curious as to what the Thai leadership thinks it's accomplishing with these actions. Honestly, without these cases, I'd never even know about the Thai king at all. It seems like each of these actions only brings greater negative attention on the king than if he'd just ignored such things.

Filed Under: anthony chai, free speech, joe gordeon, lese majeste, thailand