Recent revelations in the Hindu have raised concerns over the extraordinary extent of domestic surveillance online, without any legal and procedural framework to protect privacy.
The criminalisation of online speech in India is of concern as the authorities have prosecuted legitimate political comment online and personal views expressed on social media.
Since 2003, the institutional structure of internet censorship and filtering has centred on the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (ICERT), a department of the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology that serves as a nodal agency for accepting and reviewing requests from a designated pool of government officials to block access to specific websites.
The country’s media labelled a “very willing accomplice” to the disappearances of thousands of Baloch nationalists, allegedly at the hands of state security apparatus. Zofeen Ebrahim reports
“I am Malala” is accused of being against Islam and the constitution, but some prominent Pakistanis see the censoring of the book in private schools as a loss to millions of children, writes Zofeen Ebrahim
As the Commonwealth leaders converge on Colombo, the UK must confront Rajapaksa on human rights abuses
The killing of the Pakistani Taliban’s leader finds resonance across the country where anger against drone strikes is high. Zofeen Ebrahim writes
Vietnam’s government keeps cultural activities from web comics to concerts under its watchful eye, for sex as much as sedition. Helen Clark reports
Just days before the United Nation’s led Internet Governance Forum in Indonesia, India, held its own – and first of its kind – conference on cyber governance and cyber security, Mahima Kaul writes
Pakistani journalists who report on the victimisation of Ahmadis, Christians or Hindus are likely to become victims themselves, writes Zofeen Ebrahim