The Role of Information and Communications Technologies in Human Rights Monitoring and Advocacy - Information Communication Technologies for Human Services Education and Delivery - page 190

effectively exploit the opportunities presented
by new technologies is lacking. Human rights
organizations can use the Internet to create their
own online content and establish peer-to-peer
communications for widespread dissemination
of information but they need the expertise and
resources to do so in a safe environment. Web
2.0 technologies and applications like social
bookmarking, wikis, blogs, tags, and RSS (Real
Simple Syndication) have helped enormously
however. According to (Krasne, 2005) they are
already allowing non-profit supporters to build
movements for social, environmental, economic,
and political change, and the human rights move-
ment is no exception in this regard.
The main threat to the safety of human rights
groups that use the Internet is that governments
fearful of the free flow of information purpose-
fully try to control or hinder it. In June 2006, for
example, the Chinese government announced it
was going to step up control of search engines
and blogs to block what it called “illegal and
unhealthy” content, and western based Internet
companies operating in the Chinese market were
not slow to help them do this by allowing their
tools to be used for surveillance activities and
censorship. But the Chinese authorities are not
alone in their implementation of restrictive and
punitive measures that deny online freedom of
expression and information. In 2004, Reporters
without Borders chronicled a long list of regimes
opposed to Internet freedom. They reported that
in Vietnam, for example, web content is exten-
sively censored and e-mail is monitored in order
to track down “subversive” Internet users. In
Burma only a few hundred hand-picked people -
regime officials, top military figures and heads of
export companies - are officially allowed Internet
access. And in Tunisia, where press freedom is
non-existent and many have looked to the Inter-
net as a source of independent information and a
place for debating ideas, the determination to gag
the Internet is such that the only Internet service
providers allowed to serve the public are those

owned by the president's associates (Reporters
Without Borders, 2004).
The practices of Internet surveillance and
censorship continue around the world, with
governments using the presence of undesirable
or critical material as a justification for repres-
sive controls and laws. In November 2008, for
example, Reporters Without Borders reported
that an Egyptian blogger who was arrested in
November 2006 because of articles he posted
was still serving a prison sentence for “insulting
Islam” and “insulting the president” (Reporters
Without Borders, 2008). His “crime” was the fact
that he had criticized the authoritarian abuses of
President Mubarak, and the practice of separat-
ing the sexes in the university in which he was
studying law.
Equally worrying is the fact that law enforce-
ment and intelligence agencies around the world
have developed new surveillance capabilities and
have been given new legal powers to monitor In-
ternet users in response to the threat of terrorism.
Some countries have even introduced legislation
justifying and encouraging such practices, and this
further increases the persecution and suffering of
human rights defenders. It also undermines their
legitimate work and introduces new vulnerabili-
ties within the human rights movement. The key
to dealing with these threats is security; human
rights defenders need to secure their work by
learning about the technologies they use, and in
particular about the concepts of computer and
Internet operations (Vitaliev, 2007). This, accord-
ing to Vitalev, will make them more effective in
protecting themselves and in promoting the rights
of those they try to defend.
Vitalev (2007) outlines the key elements of
information and communications security for
human rights defenders and organizations at risk.
The first is to secure the physical environment in
which they operate, as most security incidents that
affect the work and livelihood of human rights
defenders are connected with physical violence
and intrusion into their workplace. But while good