Twitter to censor content in specific countries

by on January 27th, 2012 1

Microblogging site Twitter announced yesterday that the company would now be able to block its content in specific countries, while making it available to the rest of the world. Twitter’s commitment to free speech, is likely to be a  hurdle, as the company plans to expand to new countries and widen its user base.

“The open exchange of information can have a positive global impact … almost every country in the world agrees that freedom of expression is a human right. Many countries also agree that freedom of expression carries with it responsibilities and has limits. As we continue to grow internationally, we will enter countries that have different ideas about the contours of freedom of expression. Some differ so much from our ideas that we will not be able to exist there. Others are similar but, for historical or cultural reasons, restrict certain types of content, such as France or Germany, which ban pro-Nazi content,” the Twitter blog states.

“We do not remove Tweets on the basis of their content. Our position on freedom of expression carries with it a mandate to protect our users’ right to speak freely and preserve their ability to contest having their private information revealed,” the microblog adds.

Before coming up with this censorship tool, removal of a tweet, would require Twitter to censor it in all the countries where the service is being used. The new approach would make the tweet available to as many people as possible, and  it would be blocked only in the countries that request for censorship.

To maintain transparency, Twitter will post a censorship notice whenever a tweet is removed. The company has partnered with Chilling Effects to dedicate a new page(http://chillingeffects.org/twitter) to such notices.

 

 

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