[IRP] FW: [URGENT] Internet Censorship in Venezuela. Bill on Social Responsibly of Internet service providers and electronic media + Creation of National Internet Exchange Point
Graciela Selaimen
graciela
Thu Dec 16 13:04:07 EET 2010
There is a discussion going on in the ALC-CMSI list (Latin American
Caucus for the WSIS) -
http://mailman-new.greennet.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/alc-cmsi
It is an important space for anyone who might be interested to be aware
of the difefrent opinions from people from the region on this issue.*
*regards,
Graciela*
*
Em 12/16/10 8:14 AM, Lisa Horner escreveu:
>
> Hi all
>
> Please see below information about the worrying bills that have been
> presented in Venezuela. Is there anything we can do on this?
>
> Apologies for cross posting.
>
> All the best,
>
> Lisa
>
> *From:*Pedro Less Andrade [mailto:pedroless at google.com]
> *Sent:* 15 December 2010 23:34
> *To:* Kurt Opsahl; <katitza at eff.org>; Sonja Gittens-Ottley; Sebastian
> Bellagamba; Ra?l Echeberr?a; Alejandro Pisanty; OscarM; Cynthia Wong;
> Ruth Puente; Lisa Horner
> *Subject:* Re: [URGENT] Internet Censorship in Venezuela. Bill on
> Social Responsibly of Internet service providers and electronic media
> + Creation of National Internet Exchange Point
>
> Hi all,
>
> The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and its Office
> of the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression just sent a press
> release today on the Venezuelan issue.
>
> http://www.cidh.oas.org/Comunicados/English/2010/122-10eng.htm
> <http://www.cidh.oas.org/Comunicados/English/2010/122-10eng.htm>
>
> http://www.cidh.oas.org/Comunicados/Spanish/2010/122-10sp.htm
>
> It has very good paragraphs on freedom of expression and Internet.
>
> Please, circulate this among your contacts and the Internet community.
>
>
> Best,
>
> Pedro
>
> On Sun, Dec 12, 2010 at 1:32 PM, Pedro Less Andrade
> <pedroless at google.com <mailto:pedroless at google.com>> wrote:
>
> Dear all,
>
> You might heard about these two bills that are going to be debated at
> Venezuela National Assembly next Tuesday. Those represent a serious
> threat to free expression online. It will be interesting the
> possibility to have a strong coordinated response from the Internet
> Community.
>
> Please find below a report that I prepared about the two bills:
>
> On December 10, we learned about a two new attempts to censor Internet
> in Venezuela:
>
> 1. A new bill that will go to parliament next week to amend the Law
> of Social Responsibly for Radio and Television and adds special
> provisions for__Internet service providers and electronic media.
> Please find the text of the bill here
> <http://www.asambleanacional.gob.ve/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=2760&tmpl=component&format=raw&Itemid=185&lang=es> from
> the National Assembly website (also attached). The National Assembly
> scheduled the debate of the new bill for Tuesday December 14.
>
> 2. There is another bill to reform the National Organic
> Telecommunications Law. Section 212 of the bill established a National
> Internet Exchange Point (IPX or NAP). This will be a way for the
> government to have a centralized Internet point of access to the
> country an control the traffic get in and out of the country. Please
> find the bill here
> <http://www.asambleanacional.gob.ve/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=2761&tmpl=component&format=raw&Itemid=185&lang=es> (also
> attached).
>
> Manuel Villalba, a lawmaker from President Hugo Chavez's Socialist
> Party, said the law was aimed at protecting citizens.
>
> "Nowhere is the restriction of access to the Internet suggested.
> There should just exist protection of citizens' moral and ethical
> honor," said Villalba, who heads the National Assembly's media
> commission.
>
> The bill allows the government to restrict access to websites if they
> are found to be distributing messages or information that incite
> violence against the president. The bill also applies limits on
> content in "electronic media" according to the time of day, with adult
> content reserved for programing after midnight.
>
> I made a preliminary assessment of both bills:
>
> *1. About the Bill on Social Responsibly:*
>
> Section 1: The "purpose" of the bill is to _establish the social
> responsibility_ of _providers of radio and television
> services, Internet service providers and electronic media,
> advertisers, independent national produces, and users _to promote
> democratic equilibrium between their
>
> duties, rights and interests for the purposes of promote social
> justice and contribute to citizenship formation, democracy,
> peace, human rights, culture, education, health and social and
> economic development, in accordance with the rules and principles
> of constitutional law for the integral protection of children and
> adolescents, culture, education, social security, free competition and
> the Organic Law of Telecommunications.
>
> The bill is very ambiguous and vague because it extends the
> application of the prior law (aimed to regulate Radio and TV) to the
> Internet sphere. It is not clear what applies to Internet Service
> providers and electronic media and what not.
>
> The bill defines 4 elements to be classified: language, sex, health
> and violence. And categorized each element into different levels of
> publishing or broadcasting: A, B, C, D and sometimes E.
>
> *Section 8 defines the prohibitions *for Radio,**TV and *Electronic
> Media* in connection with content that:
>
> 1. contain elements of sex type "E" health "D" and violence "C".
> 2. may incite hatred or promote religious, political, gender
> intolerance or racism or xenophobia.
> 3. incite or promote and / or justify crime.
> 4. could be war propaganda
> 5. may be handled and designed by media to promote unrest in
> the citizenship or disturb public order.
> 6. may be destined to ignore the legally constituted
> authorities, disrespect to the authorities or persons carrying
> these charges.
> 7. could lead to president assassination.
> 8. could incite or promote breach of law.
> 9. offend good customs.
> 10. use visual techniques, sound or contexts that prevent or hinder
> the users to perceive them consciously.
>
> Internet Service Providers should establish mechanism to restrict,
> without delay, the dissemination of and access to content subsumed
> under the prohibitions contained in paragraphs 2,3,4,5,6,7,8, 9 and
> 10, when requested by National Telecommunications Commission
> in exercise of its powers. The National Telecommunications Commission
> may order Internet Service Providers to restrict access to messages
> and reported portals.
>
> Internet service providers will be responsible for the information and
> content prohibited referred in this Article, in cases that they
> originated the transmittion, modified the data, selected
> the recipients fail to limited the access to them in response to the
> request made by
> bodies with jurisdiction in the matter.
>
> *Section 28 subsections 3 and 4*: extend sanctions to ISPs. Penalties
> could range from 3-4% of their annual gross income. Those penalties
> has a particular focus on advertisement associated with different
> activities (professional services without the proper national
> certification, beneficial institutions without the proper
> registration, tabacco, alcohol,sexual services and products, ads
> against transport law (I imagine speeding, radars detectors) among
> others.
>
> *Section 29* established additional penalties, suspension and
> revocation of government concesions to provide their services.
>
> The penalties could go up to 10% and suspensions of services up to 72
> hours, when providers disseminate the following type of messages:
>
> a) Those that promote, advocate or incite war
> b) Those that promote, advocate or incite public disturbances;
> c) Those that promote, advocate or incite crime;
> d) Those that may incite hatred or promote religious,
> political, gender intolerance or racism or xenophobia.
> e) Those that may be discriminatory
> f) Those that may be contrary to National security;
> g) Anonymous messages.
> h) Those that could be war propaganda
> i) Those that could be handled and designed by media to promote unrest
> in the citizenship or disturb public order.
> j) Those that are intended to ignore the legally constituted
> authorities, disrespecting the public authorities or persons carrying
> these authorities.
> k) Those which could lead to president assassination
>
> Revocation will take place when providers subject to this
> law repeated the conducts sanctioned above.
>
> *_2. About the Bill amending the National Organic Telecommunications
> Law:_*
>
> *New Section 212: Creation of National **Exchange Point or Network
> Access Point for Internet Service Providers in Venezuela*
>
> The State create an Exchange Point or Network Access Point for
> Internet Service Providers in Venezuela in order to manage the traffic
> from and to Venezuela with the purpose to having a more efficient use
> of the networks in the country, given the strategic nature of the
> sector. The governing body (National Telecommunications Commission)
> will determine the State enterprise that will be responsible for
> installation, operation and maintenance of the Exchange Point or
> Network Access Point for Internet Service Providers and will issue, by
> resolution, the rules applicable to determine the model,
> constraints, requirements, implementation schedule and any other
> matter necessary to achieve the conditions that may be appropriate
> for proper implementation.
>
> If the government force all the national ISPs to connect to the
> IXP/NAP the will have the technical ability to inspect, filter and
> block internet traffic from and to Venezuela.
>
> *_Conclusions:_*
>
> This constitutes a flaflagrant violations to the OAS Inter-american
> Convention of Human Rights, particularly sections related to freedom
> of speech and indirect censorship.
>
> If both bills got passed, Internet services, particularly web 2.0
> platforms, will face increasing blocking and filtering in Venezuela,
> at ISP level.
>
> *_Useful links:_*
>
> *Press:*
>
> http://ca.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idCATRE6B90SA20101210 (Reuters,
> English)
>
> http://fromtheold.com/news/internet/chavez-plans-censor-internet-20933 (English)
>
> http://www.codigovenezuela.com/2010/12/noticias/politico/la-censura-para-internet-se-discute-el-martes/
>
> http://caracas.eluniversal.com/2010/12/10/pol_ava_gobierno-creara-punt_10A4839611.shtml
>
> *Blogs:*
>
> Internet censorship in Venezuela: the real objectives (in English):
> http://daniel-venezuela.blogspot.com/2010/12/internet-censorship-in-venezuela-real.html
>
> *Venezuela's National Assembly Website:*
>
> * Proyecto de Ley de Reforma de la Ley Org?nica de
> Telecomunicaciones
> <http://www.asambleanacional.gob.ve/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=2761&tmpl=component&format=raw&Itemid=185&lang=es>
>
> * Proyecto de Ley De Reforma de La Ley de Responsabilidad Social
> en Radio y Televisi?n
> <http://www.asambleanacional.gob.ve/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=2760&tmpl=component&format=raw&Itemid=185&lang=es>
>
> Best,
>
> Pedro
>
> --
> Pedro Less Andrade ? Gerente Senior de Asuntos Gubernamentales y
> Pol?ticas P?blicas / Senior Policy Counsel ? Google ? Latin America
> O: +54 11 5530 3209 ? M: +54 911 6242 4153 ? pedroless at google.com
> <mailto:pedroless at google.com>
>
>
>
>
> --
> --
> Pedro Less Andrade ? Gerente Senior de Asuntos Gubernamentales y
> Pol?ticas P?blicas / Senior Policy Counsel ? Google ? Latin America
> O: +54 11 5530 3209 ? M: +54 911 6242 4153 ? pedroless at google.com
> <mailto:pedroless at google.com>
>
>
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