Participants in Brazil’s NETMundial left the meeting with dashed expectations, Simone Marques reports
NETmundial: Disappointed expectations and delayed decisions
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CATEGORY: United States
“If you read, write, publish, think, listen, dance, sing or invent, the TPP has you in its crosshairs”
With secret trade negotiations reportedly at a critical stage, campaigners have mounted a global plan to draw the attention to the role that internet providers would play in preventing the free flow of information. Alastair Sloan reports
45 reasons why I think twice despite the First Amendment
Poet Maya Weeks explores the 45 reasons she thinks twice, despite the protections afforded to her as an American.
Irresistible: Espionage, dissent and NGOs
Edward Snowden’s revelations on the voracious appetite of spying on all and sundry by the National Security Agency and allied agencies should not give pause for too much comment, other than to affirm a general premise: Activists and non-government groups are to be feared.
Reform by expansion: Sharpening bulk collection
Reforms can be a deceptive thing. They can be particularly deceptive when covering the intelligence community, which is notoriously resistant to legislative meddling it tends to find intrusive. Binoy Kampmark writes
Media freedom: In good health or under threat – how do the US and EU compare?
Index hosts a Google Hangout with New York-based Guardian Digital journalist James Ball, and LA Times London correspondent, Henry Chu
Index Freedom of Expression Awards: Digital activism nominee Edward Snowden
In 2013, National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden leaked thousands of documents detailing US government surveillance to the press, igniting a global debate on the ways authorities can watch citizens’ communications
“Hyperlink” charges against Barrett Brown dropped in “victory for press freedom”
The case continues to highlight the question, are journalists complicit in a crime when sharing illegally obtained information in the course of their professional duties? Christian Stork reports
Index Freedom of Expression Awards: Journalism nominees Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras
Greenwald and Poitras uncovered the biggest international story of 2013, using leaks from the USA’s National Security Agency to illuminate the breadth of online surveillance carried out by governments.
Is Reddit censoring climate change deniers?
San Fransisco based Reddit.com made headlines when it allegedly banned climate change deniers from posting on the site. But what’s the truth behind the uproar? Alastair Sloan reports
PEN America survey: Mass surveillance causing self-censorship among writers
Sixty-six percent of American writers disapprove of their government’s collection of phone and internet data, according to a survey from the Pen American Center.
Surveillance critic barred from US
Author Ilija Trojanow, a driving force behind an anti-surveillance campaign, was travelling to the US for a conference on German literature. That was his plan, anyway. At an airport in Brazil, he was told his entry to the US had been denied. No explanation was provided then, and none has been provided since, Milana Knezevic writes
Smears about the media made by US President Donald Trump have obscured a wider problem with press freedom in the United States: namely widespread and low-level animosity that feeds into the everyday working lives of the nation’s journalists, bloggers and media professionals. This study examines documented reports from across the country in the six months leading up to the presidential inauguration and the months after. It clearly shows that threats to US press freedom go well beyond the Oval Office.
“Animosity toward the press comes in many forms. Journalists are targeted in several ways: from social media trolling to harassment by law enforcement to over-the-top public criticism by those in the highest office. The negative atmosphere for journalists is damaging for the public and their right to information,” said Jodie Ginsberg, CEO at Index on Censorship, which documented the cases using an approach undertaken by the organization to monitor press freedom in Europe over the past three years. Learn more.
