CENSORSHIP SUMMIT: Facebook Meets with China’s Propaganda Chief

We’ve talked about Facebook’s pro-censorship stance (see Facebook Has Officially Begun Censoring Germany… and Mark Zuckerberg Caught On Mic Saying Facebook Will Delete Negative German Govt. Posts). So, it really shouldn’t be shocking to see their propaganda chief, Mark Zuckerberg, meet with his Chinese counterpart Liu Yunshan.

Mark Zuckerberg has held a rare meeting with China’s propaganda chief amid a crackdown by the Beijing authorities on the use of the internet.

Liu Yunshan told Zuckerberg that he hopes FB can share its experience with Chinese companies to help “internet development better benefit the people of all countries”, the official Xinhua news agency reported. Zuckerberg was in Beijing to attend an economic forum.

China has called for the creation of a global internet “governance system” and cooperation between countries to regulate internet use, stepping up efforts to promote controls that activists complain stifle free expression.

Facebook and other western social media companies including Twitter are banned in China. Zuckerberg has long been courting China’s leaders in a so far futile attempt to access the country with the world’s largest number of Internet users — 668 million as of last year.

http://louderwithcrowder.com/censorship-summit-facebook-meets-with-china/#.VvASkfkrKUm

CENSORSHIP SUMMIT: FACEBOOK MEETS WITH CHINA’S PROPAGANDA CHIEF…

Mark Zuckerberg has held a rare meeting with China’s propaganda chief amid a crackdown by the Beijing authorities on the use of the internet.

Liu Yunshan told Zuckerberg that he hopes FB can share its experience with Chinese companies to help “internet development better benefit the people of all countries”, the official Xinhua news agency reported. Zuckerberg was in Beijing to attend an economic forum.

China has called for the creation of a global internet “governance system” and cooperation between countries to regulate internet use, stepping up efforts to promote controls that activists complain stifle free expression.

Facebook and other western social media companies including Twitter are banned in China. Zuckerberg has long been courting China’s leaders in a so far futile attempt to access the country with the world’s largest number of Internet users — 668 million as of last year.

http://www.infowars.com/censorship-summit-facebook-meets-with-chinas-propaganda-chief/

How The EU’s Proposed New ‘Privacy’ Rules Will Be A Tool For Massive Censorship

We recently wrote about some concerns about the new Data Protection Directive that is being set up in Europe. The law is driven by people with good intentions: looking to better protect the privacy of European citizens. Privacy protection is an important concept — but the current plans appear to be so focused on privacy protection that it gives very little regard for the unintended consequences of the way it’s been set up. As we wrote in our last post, Daphne Keller at Stanford’s Center for Internet and Society is writing a series of blog posts raising concerns about how the new rules clash with basic concepts of free speech. She’s now written one about the immensely troubling setup of the “notice and takedown” rules included in the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). For years, we’ve been concerned by problematic notice and takedown procedures — we’ve seen the DMCA frequently abused to stifle speech, rather than for genuine copyright challenges. But, for some reason, people often immediately leap to “notice and takedown solutions” for any kind of content they don’t like, they and the drafters of the GDPR are no different.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20151029/07290832661/how-eus-proposed-new-privacy-rules-will-be-tool-massive-censorship.shtml%3ETechdirt%3C/a%3E%20%3C/span%3E%20%7C%3Cspan%20style=

HOW THE EU’S PROPOSED NEW ‘PRIVACY’ RULES WILL BE A TOOL FOR MASSIVE CENSORSHIP

 An individual submits a removal request, and perhaps communicates further with the intermediary to clarify what she is asking for.

1. In most cases, prior to assessing the request’s legal validity, the intermediary temporarily suspends or “restricts” the content so it is no longer publicly available.
2. The intermediary reviews the legal claim made by the requester to decide if it is valid. For difficult questions, the intermediary may be allowed to consult with the user who posted the content.
3. For valid claims, the intermediary proceeds to fully erase the content. (Or probably, in the case of search engines, de-link it following guidelines of the Costeja “Right to Be Forgotten” ruling.) For invalid claims, the intermediary is supposed to bring the content out of “restriction” and reinstate it to public view — though it’s not clear what happens if it doesn’t bother to do so.
4. The intermediary informs the requester of the outcome, and communicates the removal request to any “downstream” recipients who got the same data from the controller.
5. If the intermediary has additional contact details or identifying information about the user who posted the now-removed content, it may have to disclose them to the individual who asked for the removal, subject to possible but unclearly drafted exceptions. (Council draft, Art. 14a)
6. In most cases, the accused publisher receives no notice that her content has been removed, and no opportunity to object. The GDPR text does not spell out this prohibition, but does nothing to change the legal basis for the Article 29 Working Party’s conclusions on this point.
7. http://www.infowars.com/how-the-eus-proposed-new-privacy-rules-will-be-a-tool-for-massive-censorship/