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UN Cites
Outsourcing to Defend Blocking Web Sites of its Critics, Censorship
Alleged
Byline: Matthew Russell
Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
April 21 -- Following its exposure that
the UN
blocks access by its employees to websites
such as anti-cnn.com and DailyMotion.com,
Inner
City Press asked Spokesperson
Marie Okabe to justify the
censorship. She responded "an answer is in the works for you, the UN is
no
different than any other organization in that it does have a management
policy
for its website." She provided a half-page printout of an email,
stating
that
"I read the Inner City Press article and there are
three sites
mentioned... anti-cnn.com, this site is blocked and is in the 'Spam'
category;
DailyMotion.com, this site is blocked and is in the 'Pornography'
category...
We have equipment installed in between our internet connection and the
internal
UN network which has a 'web content filter.' This company that provides
this
filter collects information from thousands of web sites throughout the
world
and categorizes them on a daily basis. The UN currently filters sites
that are
categorized as gambling, pornography, anonymizers, malicious sites,
peer-to-peer and personal storage, remote access, spyware, hacking,
spam."
But, for example, the web site
"GlobalCompactCritics.net"
is blocked. Attempts from inside the UN,
by staff or in
the library, to read the site results in a
message from the "ICT Security
Unit" that "you have been redirected to this page because the site
you are attempting to access is blocked according to the policy as
detailed in
ST/SGB/2004/15.
This Secretary-General's
Bulletin
allows staff "limited personal use of ICT resources" unless these
involve "pornography or engaging in gambling" or would
"compromise the interests or the reputation of the Organization."
Ban Ki-moon and Global Compact, critics not
shown - or viewable
But whether or not the UN
Organization agrees with the critique offered, for example, by
GlobalCompactCritics.net, it is neither pornography or gambling. If
this site "compromise
the interests or the reputation of the Organization" then any number of
other sites could be blocked. Inner City Press has asked the Chinese
Mission to
the UN about the blocking of anti-cnn.com. We will not publicly
criticize it,
was the answer, but they shouldn't criticize us. Inner City Press early
on
April 21 asked UNESCO's spokesperson in New York
"On deadline, this is a request for a comment from
UNESCO on the
fact that within UN Headquarters, web sites such as www.anti-cnn.com,
dailymotion.com and, reportedly, globalcompactcritics.net, are blocked
and
cannot be accessed by UN staff. Is UNESCO aware of any other
non-gambling,
non-pornography sites which are blocked
within UN headquarters? Does UNESCO
monitor this? If not, why not? If so,
please name the sites. If the response is that filtering sites has been
outsourced, is that a response that UNESCO would find acceptable from
governments?"
We'll continue to follow
this issue -- watch
this site.
* * *
These reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
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