IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - 75

THE SOCIAL WEB

A Special Report

access to Facebook
and Twitter and tem-
porarily limits many
domestic social
-networking sites.

Censoring Social Media

The ability to share status updates, photos, and videos
with an online network is taken for granted in much of
the world. But some regimes view social networking sites
as a threat to stability and restrict their citizens' access
to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and the like. Here are a
few flash points of censorship from the last decade.
November
2003: The
"Great
Firewall of China,"
which allows the
Chinese government
to block Internet sites
and keep users under
surveillance, goes
into operation.

November
2007: Syria
blocks access
to Facebook as part of
a crackdown on politi-
cal activism on the
Internet. The authori-
ties claim the site is a
dangerous conduit for
Israeli propaganda.

February
2008: The
Pakistani
government tries to
block a YouTube
video that mocks
Muhammad but ends
up shutting down
YouTube worldwide
for a few hours.

June 2009:
In response
to protests
over Iran's disputed
presidential election,
the Iranian govern-
ment in-creas-es its
intensive Internet
censorship. Despite
inter-mit-tent shut-
downs of Twitter
and YouTube, Iranian
protesters use these
sites to air their
grievances before
the world.
June 2009:
In fear of pro-
tests around
the 20th anniversary
of the Tiananmen
Square massacre, the
Chinese government
permanently blocks

May 2010:
Pakistan
temporarily
blocks Facebook in
response to a Face-
book group promoting
"Everybody Draw
Mohammad Day,"
which the authorities
consider blasphemous.
15 November
2010: A
Chinese
woman is sentenced
to one year in a labor
camp because of a
single satirical tweet.
December
2010: The
Tunisian
government harvests
log-in and password
details from Facebook
and uses them to
delete Facebook
groups, pages, and
accounts. But Tunisian
protests continue.

13 January
2011: The
Tunisian
president announces
that the government
will lift its ban on
video-sharing sites
like YouTube and
Vimeo in a move
intended to placate
protesters. But dem-
onstrations soon top-
ple the government.
January
2011: Egyp-
tian protest-
ers organize demon-
strations through the
Facebook page "We
Are All Khaled Said,"
honoring an Egyptian
man allegedly beaten
to death by police.
27 January
2011: The
Egyptian
government shuts
down the country's
entire Internet, but
demonstrations esca-
late. On 2  February
Internet service is
restored, and on
11 February president
Hosni Mubarak
resigns.
February
2011:
Because the
Libyan government is
monitoring Facebook
and Twitter, would-be
revolutionaries find
each other via a
-Muslim dating site.

JUNE 2011 * IEEE SPECTRUM * NA

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Spectrum June, 2011

IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - Cover1
IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - Cover2
IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - 1
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IEEE Spectrum June, 2011 - Cover3
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