Egypt: U.S helps cyber dissidents & democracy activists says Clinton
Post date: Feb 15, 2011 9:57:33 PM
Clinton: U.S. to boost
support for cyber dissidents
The recent events in Middle East
show the importance of Google, Facebook, Twitter
during political crisis and change
"Leaders worldwide have a choice to make,"
Clinton said. "They can let the Internet in their countries flourish, and take the risk that the freedoms it enables will lead to a greater demand for political rights. Or they can constrict the Internet, choke the freedoms it naturally sustains, and risk losing all the economic and social benefits that come from a networked society."
Get around Internet Filters
The U.S. will "help people in oppressive Internet environments get around filters, stay one step ahead of the censors, the hackers and the thugs who beat them up or imprison them for what they say online," she said in the speech to students at the George Washington University
.
Hillary Clinton pledged to expand the Obama administration's efforts to foil Internet repression in autocratic states.
INTERNET FREEDOM Egypt
In an impassioned speech on Internet freedom, Clinton said the administration would spend $25 million this year on initiatives designed to protect bloggers and help them get around curbs like the Great Firewall of China, the gagging of social media sites in Iran, Cuba, Syria,Vietnam and Myanmar as well as Egypt's recent unsuccessful attempt to thwart anti-government protests by simply pulling the plug on online communication.
She also said the State Department, which last week launched Twitter feeds in Arabic and Farsi to connect with populations throughout the Arab countries
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
don't block Twitter
gave a major speech on Internet freedom today at Washington, DC's Newseum, and she didn't hesitate to call out censorship regimes. Countries that heavily censor the 'Net are creating a new "Information Curtain" to rival the old Iron Curtain of the Cold War era.
"New technologies do not take sides,"
said Clinton.
"But the United States does." The US government will take a worldwide stand for a "single Internet" and will oppose the efforts of China, Tunisia, Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia to impose censorship, detain bloggers, block Twitter, and cut off social networking sites.
source: usatoday.com