Agence France Presse -- English
August 10, 2006 Thursday 9:16 AM GMT
BYLINE: Frank Zeller
DATELINE: HANOI, Aug 10 2006
Vietnam's increasingly sophisticated Internet censors mostly block
political rather than pornographic content, a new study by several of the
world's top universities has found.
The communist nation "is focusing its filtering on sites considered
threatening to its one-party system," said the report by the OpenNet
Initiative (ONI) of the Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge and Toronto
universities.
The state is targeting websites, blogs, email and online discussion
forums, said the study released internationally this week.
"While Vietnam claims its blocking efforts are aimed at safeguarding the
country against obscene or sexually explicit content, most of its
filtering efforts are aimed at blocking sites with politically or
religiously sensitive material that could undermine Vietnam's one-party
system," it said.
Vietnam mainly filters out sites on political dissidents, other regime
opponents and human rights issues as well as pages on religious freedom,
Buddhism and the mainly Christian Montagnard ethnic minorities, it said.
"Surprisingly, Vietnam does not block any pornographic content, despite
the state's putative focus on preventing access to sexually explicit
material," said the report posted at
www.opennet.net/studies/vietnam/
The government denied the claims Thursday.
"Our policy is to apply measures to prevent youngsters from unhealthy
sites," Foreign Ministry spokesman Le Dung told a regular press briefing.
"We do not apply any measures for political goals. Our policy is to
broaden Internet access for our students."
By Asian standards, he said, "the rate of Internet users is rather high."
The 2005-2006 ONI study found the "technical sophistication, breadth and
effectiveness" of the filtering are increasing, and that the government
has targeted Vietnamese-language sites more than those in English and
French.
"Vietnam's Internet censorship regime shares aspects of the Chinese
regime, reflecting the close ties between these states," said John
Palfrey, head of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard
Law School.
"Since 2001, we've seen more and more sophisticated Internet filtering
systems put in place."
Vietnam bans tools used to bypass filtering and prohibits web-surfers from
using foreign Internet service providers (ISPs), researchers said.
The two main local ISPs, FPT and VNPT, "filtered high percentages of
politically sensitive content, including content related to political
opposition, pro-democracy movements and human rights."
The country of 83 million people now has nearly 13 million Internet users,
most of whom use cybercafes, according to the business group the Ho Chi
Minh City Informatics Association.
Vietnamese law criminalises use of the Internet to oppose the state or to
destabilize national security, the economy or social order.
One of Vietnam's most prominent jailed dissidents, Pham Hong Son, is
serving a five-year sentence for translating and publishing online an
article entitled 'What is Democracy' from the US State Department's
website.
The OpenNet report pointed out that cybercafes are required to track all
websites their customers visit and record their ID card or credit card
numbers.
"Similar to China, Vietnam has taken a multi-layered approach to
controlling the Internet," said the study. "Vietnam applies technical
controls, the law and education to restrict its citizens' access to and
use of information."
August 10, 2006 Thursday 9:16 AM GMT
BYLINE: Frank Zeller
DATELINE: HANOI, Aug 10 2006
Vietnam's increasingly sophisticated Internet censors mostly block
political rather than pornographic content, a new study by several of the
world's top universities has found.
The communist nation "is focusing its filtering on sites considered
threatening to its one-party system," said the report by the OpenNet
Initiative (ONI) of the Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge and Toronto
universities.
The state is targeting websites, blogs, email and online discussion
forums, said the study released internationally this week.
"While Vietnam claims its blocking efforts are aimed at safeguarding the
country against obscene or sexually explicit content, most of its
filtering efforts are aimed at blocking sites with politically or
religiously sensitive material that could undermine Vietnam's one-party
system," it said.
Vietnam mainly filters out sites on political dissidents, other regime
opponents and human rights issues as well as pages on religious freedom,
Buddhism and the mainly Christian Montagnard ethnic minorities, it said.
"Surprisingly, Vietnam does not block any pornographic content, despite
the state's putative focus on preventing access to sexually explicit
material," said the report posted at
www.opennet.net/studies/vietnam/
The government denied the claims Thursday.
"Our policy is to apply measures to prevent youngsters from unhealthy
sites," Foreign Ministry spokesman Le Dung told a regular press briefing.
"We do not apply any measures for political goals. Our policy is to
broaden Internet access for our students."
By Asian standards, he said, "the rate of Internet users is rather high."
The 2005-2006 ONI study found the "technical sophistication, breadth and
effectiveness" of the filtering are increasing, and that the government
has targeted Vietnamese-language sites more than those in English and
French.
"Vietnam's Internet censorship regime shares aspects of the Chinese
regime, reflecting the close ties between these states," said John
Palfrey, head of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard
Law School.
"Since 2001, we've seen more and more sophisticated Internet filtering
systems put in place."
Vietnam bans tools used to bypass filtering and prohibits web-surfers from
using foreign Internet service providers (ISPs), researchers said.
The two main local ISPs, FPT and VNPT, "filtered high percentages of
politically sensitive content, including content related to political
opposition, pro-democracy movements and human rights."
The country of 83 million people now has nearly 13 million Internet users,
most of whom use cybercafes, according to the business group the Ho Chi
Minh City Informatics Association.
Vietnamese law criminalises use of the Internet to oppose the state or to
destabilize national security, the economy or social order.
One of Vietnam's most prominent jailed dissidents, Pham Hong Son, is
serving a five-year sentence for translating and publishing online an
article entitled 'What is Democracy' from the US State Department's
website.
The OpenNet report pointed out that cybercafes are required to track all
websites their customers visit and record their ID card or credit card
numbers.
"Similar to China, Vietnam has taken a multi-layered approach to
controlling the Internet," said the study. "Vietnam applies technical
controls, the law and education to restrict its citizens' access to and
use of information."
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