1) Internet censorship is the control or suppression of the publishing or accessing of information on the Internet.
2) The Philippines has 2 million Internet users, but they are mostly concentrated in the urban areas. Although households with personal computers account for less than three percent of the population, the country has a high density of mobile phone ownership, with an estimated 12 million subscribers sending out a huge volume of text messages daily.
The Philippine Congress is presently considering an anti-terrorism bill that proposes sanction arrest and detention without court orders, the sequestering of bank deposits and assets of suspected terrorists and their supporters, and which authorises the government to conduct wiretaps on those even remotely suspected of involvement in terrorist activity. Human rights groups fear that the proposed law, that permits surveillance of the Internet and e-mail, is intended to intimidate critics of the government and could violate the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free expression.
3) Internet café chain owner Netopia is urging the government to create a censorship body to monitor data flowing through the local Internet infrastructure.
The proposed censorship body will operate similarly to the Movies Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) and provide guidelines for the compliance of Internet service providers.
Netopia President Raymond Ricafort said he has been meeting with Revilla and Villar on their plan to create regulations against online pornography. Ricafort clarified however that the proposed Internet regulatory body will not have total control over local Internet loops, but instead prevent pornographic materials from being distributed through local ISPs, which have primary control over the data that travel through their servers. Ricafort added that Internet regulation and proper implementation could significantly limit the amount of indecent materials reaching users in the Philippines.
4) a. China
China has developed very sophisticated technology for intercepting and censoring Internet content. The government blocks many topics it considers sensitive or controversial and often punishes those who try to get around those bans.
The Chinese government blocks Web sites of some Western media outlets and human rights organizations- and any it deems politically or socially harmful. Chinese people trying to access information related to Taiwanese or Tibetan independence, the Dalai Lama, Tiananmen Square, SARS, opposition political parties, and anti-Communist movements will find themselves out of luck.
b. Singapore
The Singapore Broadcasting Authority (SBA) has regulated Internet content as a broadcasting service since July 1996.
The stated factors to be considered in determining what is prohibited material indicate this includes material of a pornographic nature; advocacy of “homosexuality or lesbianism”; depictions of “detailed or relished acts of extreme violence or cruelty” and material that “glorifies, incites or endorses ethnic, racial or religious hatred, strife or intolerance”. An additional factor is “whether the material has intrinsic medical, scientific, artistic or educational value”.
c. Myanmar
Myanmar’s Internet Service Providers (ISPs) block access to web sites of political opposition groups, human rights-oriented sites, and organizations working for democratic change in Myanmar. Until recently Myanmar used Dans Guardian, an open source filtering software, but has switched to a filtering product made by the U.S.-based vender Fortinet. The state also maintains the capability to conduct surveillance of e-mail as individual users are only allowed access to local email providers - free e-mail sites such as Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail are blocked.
Compared to the Philippines, the 3 countries above are far worse than Internet Censorship here. Their freedom to search or use the internet is gone. They are limited to what the government lets them see.