In this week’s #IMWeekly: a dissident Cuban blogger “disappears” from his jail cell under fishy circumstances, a former Malaysian Prime Minister backtracks on his calls for no Internet censorship, and the owner of an independent news site in Somaliland is arrested.
Calls for corporate monitoring of social media – on the grounds that some netizens may be inciting emotional, physical, or terroristic violence – have resurfaced among Ronan Farrow, critics of the #twitterpurge campaign, and #IAmJada advocates. Some journalists and media freedom activists fear that these pleas for corporate responsibility edge eerily close to censorship.
In this week's #IMWeekly: Brunei's netizens are finding their way around Sharia Law's free speech restrictions, a Cambodia-based blogger gets a heavy fine on dubious defamation charges, and Iraq starts filtering sites critical of the central government.
Moroccan rapper El Haqed, who has inspired Moroccan youth with his impassioned and urgent YouTube pleas for social justice reform, is once again under fire by Moroccan authorities. This is the third time he has been arrested since 2011 on charges his supporters claim are bogus. Many suspect that it is his provocative music, critical of the country's stagnant political climate after the supposed reforms of 2011's Moroccan Spring, that makes him an easy target.
In this week's #IMWeekly: Jordan blocks 7iber and eight other websites, Myanmar cracks down on Facebook, and more details of the USA's far-reaching surveillance tactics emerge.
It has been over a month since Thailand’s military junta, the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO), overtook the country’s government during a May 22 coup. Since then, the NCPO has aimed to consolidate political control of the country, moving online to restrict access to information.
Devu Chodankar, a 31 year-old resident of Goa, could land himself in jail after posting comments critical of India's newest Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Facebook. The case highlights a trend towards curbing online free expression in the country following Modi's widely-celebrated victory.
In this week's #IMWeekly: Australia announces a controversial surveillance bill, Iraqi netizens find a way around internet blockages, and Russia targets extremism on Twitter.
Recent social media censorship in Pakistan has sparked renewed attention to the country's blasphemy laws and how they're applied online.
In this week's #IMWeekly: Twitter frees up "blasphemous" tweets in Pakistan, an Internet shutdown in Iraq, and one of the largest DDoS attacks ever in Hong Kong.