Internet. Instead of a World Wide Web, as the data from our study of Internet filtering makes
plain, it is more accurate to say we have a Saudi Wide Web, an Uzbek Wide Web, a Pakistani
Wide Web, a Thai Wide Web, and so forth. The theory of ‘‘unregulability’’ no longer has currency, if ever it did. Many scholars have described the present reality of the reassertion of
state control online, despite continued hopes that the Internet community itself might selfregulate in new and compelling ways.
5
A key aspect of control online—and one that we prove empirically through our global study
of Internet filtering—is that states have, on an individual basis, defied the cyberlibertarians by
asserting control over the online acts of their own citizens in their home states. The manner in
which this control is exercised varies. Sometimes the law pressures citizens to refrain from
performing a certain activity online, such as accessing or publishing certain material. Sometimes the state takes control into its own hands by erecting technological or other barriers
within its confines to stop the flow of bits from one recipient to another. Increasingly, though,
the state is turning to private parties to carry out the control online. Many times, those private
parties are corporations chartered locally or individual citizens who live in that jurisdiction. In
chapter 5, we describe a related, emerging problem, in which the state requires private intermediaries whose services connect one online actor to another to participate in online censorship and surveillance as a cost of doing business in that state.
The dynamic of control online has changed greatly over the past ten years, and it is almost
certain to change just as dramatically in the ten years to come. The technologies and politics
of control of the Internet remain in flux. As one example of this continued uncertainty, participants in the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), an open global body chartered via the process
that produced two meetings of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), continue
to wrestle with a broad set of unanswered questions related to control of the online environment. At a simple level, the jurisdictional question of who can sue whom (and where that
lawsuit should be heard, and under the law of which jurisdiction decided, for that matter), remains largely unresolved, despite a growing body of case law. A series of highly distributed
problems—spam, spyware, online fraud—continues to vex law enforcement officials and
public policy–makers around the world. Intellectual property law continues to grow in complexity, despite some degree of harmonization underway among competing regimes. Each
of these problems leaves many unresolved issues of global public policy in its wake. Internet
filtering, the core focus of this book, and the related matter of online surveillance, present an
equally, if not more, fraught set of issues for global diplomats to address.
Suppressing and Controlling Information on the Internet
The idea that states would seek to control the information environment within their borders
is nothing new. Freedom of expression has never been absolute, even in those liberal democracies that hold these freedoms most dear. The same is true of the related freedoms of
Internet Filtering: The Politics and Mechanisms of Control
31
plain, it is more accurate to say we have a Saudi Wide Web, an Uzbek Wide Web, a Pakistani
Wide Web, a Thai Wide Web, and so forth. The theory of ‘‘unregulability’’ no longer has currency, if ever it did. Many scholars have described the present reality of the reassertion of
state control online, despite continued hopes that the Internet community itself might selfregulate in new and compelling ways.
5
A key aspect of control online—and one that we prove empirically through our global study
of Internet filtering—is that states have, on an individual basis, defied the cyberlibertarians by
asserting control over the online acts of their own citizens in their home states. The manner in
which this control is exercised varies. Sometimes the law pressures citizens to refrain from
performing a certain activity online, such as accessing or publishing certain material. Sometimes the state takes control into its own hands by erecting technological or other barriers
within its confines to stop the flow of bits from one recipient to another. Increasingly, though,
the state is turning to private parties to carry out the control online. Many times, those private
parties are corporations chartered locally or individual citizens who live in that jurisdiction. In
chapter 5, we describe a related, emerging problem, in which the state requires private intermediaries whose services connect one online actor to another to participate in online censorship and surveillance as a cost of doing business in that state.
The dynamic of control online has changed greatly over the past ten years, and it is almost
certain to change just as dramatically in the ten years to come. The technologies and politics
of control of the Internet remain in flux. As one example of this continued uncertainty, participants in the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), an open global body chartered via the process
that produced two meetings of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), continue
to wrestle with a broad set of unanswered questions related to control of the online environment. At a simple level, the jurisdictional question of who can sue whom (and where that
lawsuit should be heard, and under the law of which jurisdiction decided, for that matter), remains largely unresolved, despite a growing body of case law. A series of highly distributed
problems—spam, spyware, online fraud—continues to vex law enforcement officials and
public policy–makers around the world. Intellectual property law continues to grow in complexity, despite some degree of harmonization underway among competing regimes. Each
of these problems leaves many unresolved issues of global public policy in its wake. Internet
filtering, the core focus of this book, and the related matter of online surveillance, present an
equally, if not more, fraught set of issues for global diplomats to address.
Suppressing and Controlling Information on the Internet
The idea that states would seek to control the information environment within their borders
is nothing new. Freedom of expression has never been absolute, even in those liberal democracies that hold these freedoms most dear. The same is true of the related freedoms of
Internet Filtering: The Politics and Mechanisms of Control
31