with investigating and prosecuting cyber crime and cyber attacks. At present, ISPs are
required to prohibit their customers from disseminating pornographic, extremist, or
terrorist materials or any other information that is not in accordance with the country’s laws. 19 Kazakh officials are also considering additional laws to further regulate
the Kazakh Internet. 20 One draft law presently under consideration envisions liability
for owners of Web sites hosting weblogs and forums, as well as users of chat rooms.
The draft law equates Internet sites to media outlets and applies similar regulations
with respect to content. The authors of the law justified tighter oversight by the need
to fight cyber crime and provide greater accountability for Internet users.
The Kazakhstan Association of IT Companies is the officially recognized administrator of the ‘‘.kz’’ domain. It is registered as a NGO, but it has 80 percent government
ownership. The rules of registration and management of the ‘‘.kz’’ domain were issued
by the State Agency on Informatization and Communication of the Republic of
Kazakhstan in 2005. In recent years, the cost for registering and maintaining a domain
name have significantly decreased, thereby boosting the development of the Kazakh
portion of the Internet. Registrations are subject to strict regulation. Applications may
be denied if the server on which they are located resides outside Kazakhstan. Even
though the primary legislation guarantees freedom of speech and prohibits censorship,
the government often resorts to various legal mechanisms to suppress ‘‘inappropriate’’
information or to ensure that domain names used by opposition groups are frozen, or
withdrawn. As a result, very few political parties in Kazakhstan use the Internet, and
few opposition or illegal parties have an online presence (at least within the ‘‘.kz’’
domain).
The ICT sector in Kazakhstan is overregulated, as evidenced by some 300 legislative
acts that expressly or implicitly control the ICT environment. All telecommunications
operators are legally obliged, as part of the licensing requirement, to connect their
channels to a public network controlled by KazakhTelecom. The so-called Billing
Center of Telecommunication Traffic, established by the government in 1999, helps
monitor the activity of private companies and strengthen the monopolist position of
KazakhTelecom in the IT sphere. In the past, some telecommunications operators circumvented such regulations by using VoIP for their interregional and international
traffic, but the imposition of VoIP telephony tariffs eliminated this option.
Surveillance
The government has established systems to monitor and filter Internet traffic. Since the
traffic of all first-tier ISPs goes through KazakhTelecom’s channels, surveillance and
filtering is centralized. The ONI suspects that state officials informally ask KazakhTelecom to filter certain content. KazakhTelecom, along with some Russian companies,
has openly signed an agreement to provide filtering, censorship, and surveillance on
Kazakhstan
187
required to prohibit their customers from disseminating pornographic, extremist, or
terrorist materials or any other information that is not in accordance with the country’s laws. 19 Kazakh officials are also considering additional laws to further regulate
the Kazakh Internet. 20 One draft law presently under consideration envisions liability
for owners of Web sites hosting weblogs and forums, as well as users of chat rooms.
The draft law equates Internet sites to media outlets and applies similar regulations
with respect to content. The authors of the law justified tighter oversight by the need
to fight cyber crime and provide greater accountability for Internet users.
The Kazakhstan Association of IT Companies is the officially recognized administrator of the ‘‘.kz’’ domain. It is registered as a NGO, but it has 80 percent government
ownership. The rules of registration and management of the ‘‘.kz’’ domain were issued
by the State Agency on Informatization and Communication of the Republic of
Kazakhstan in 2005. In recent years, the cost for registering and maintaining a domain
name have significantly decreased, thereby boosting the development of the Kazakh
portion of the Internet. Registrations are subject to strict regulation. Applications may
be denied if the server on which they are located resides outside Kazakhstan. Even
though the primary legislation guarantees freedom of speech and prohibits censorship,
the government often resorts to various legal mechanisms to suppress ‘‘inappropriate’’
information or to ensure that domain names used by opposition groups are frozen, or
withdrawn. As a result, very few political parties in Kazakhstan use the Internet, and
few opposition or illegal parties have an online presence (at least within the ‘‘.kz’’
domain).
The ICT sector in Kazakhstan is overregulated, as evidenced by some 300 legislative
acts that expressly or implicitly control the ICT environment. All telecommunications
operators are legally obliged, as part of the licensing requirement, to connect their
channels to a public network controlled by KazakhTelecom. The so-called Billing
Center of Telecommunication Traffic, established by the government in 1999, helps
monitor the activity of private companies and strengthen the monopolist position of
KazakhTelecom in the IT sphere. In the past, some telecommunications operators circumvented such regulations by using VoIP for their interregional and international
traffic, but the imposition of VoIP telephony tariffs eliminated this option.
Surveillance
The government has established systems to monitor and filter Internet traffic. Since the
traffic of all first-tier ISPs goes through KazakhTelecom’s channels, surveillance and
filtering is centralized. The ONI suspects that state officials informally ask KazakhTelecom to filter certain content. KazakhTelecom, along with some Russian companies,
has openly signed an agreement to provide filtering, censorship, and surveillance on
Kazakhstan
187