An Internet Clean Of Jihadi Incitement – Not Mission Impossible.

An Internet Clean Of Jihadi Incitement – Not Mission Impossible. (Memri).

Social media companies are beginning to lose advertising revenue due to the hateful content that appears on their sites. According to reports, major advertisers (Johnson & Johnson, Toyota, General Motors, Walmart, AT&T, HSBC, and others) are pulling ads from social media platforms because they have found their ads placed alongside terrorist videos. YouTube alone may find itself losing $750,000,000 in ad revenue.[1] It therefore seems as if financial considerations rather than moral responsibility are prompting Internet companies to take more vigorous measures to purge their platforms of hate speech and incitement to murder.

Government pressure on the companies is mounting as well. In Germany, Justice Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) is introducing new legislation imposing huge fines of up to 50 million Euros on companies that fail to remove hate speech from their sites. In Britain after the recent Westminster terrorist attack, Home Secretary Amber Rudd summoned executives from Google, Twitter, Facebook and Microsoft to a summit at the Home Office, at which they agreed to "create new technical tools to identify and remove terrorist propaganda" from their platforms, among other measures.[2]

In addition, the families of terror victims are beginning to sue Internet companies for carrying the incitement that radicalized the terrorists and thus led to the killing or injury of their loved ones. One successful lawsuit of this sort will trigger a torrent of further lawsuits, entailing huge losses for the companies.

But will any of this guarantee an Internet free of hate speech and jihadi incitement? No. Not until both the governments and the Internet companies understand that the use of the Internet by jihadi movements poses a real threat to global security, which amounts to an emergency situation requiring them to act accordingly – namely, to make vast financial investments, to develop new technologies, and, most importantly, to fundamentally change their approach and the criteria they employ in removing content from the net.

The goals of this article are: 

• first, to present the scope of the problem; 
• second, to demonstrate the inadequacy of the measures taken to date to deal with it; 
• third, to explain the need for a revolutionary approach; 
• and fourth, to present in detail the components of a new, effective strategy to be implemented.

How Did It All Begin?

To understand the magnitude of the threat and the measures required to address it, one must go back to the beginnings of the Internet and of social media.

The Internet, just like nuclear energy and other developments in modern technology, is both a blessing and a source of danger. In most other fields, scientific and technological developments were followed by regulatory legislation to head off potential danger to society and to human life. Land, maritime, and aerial transportation, the pharmaceutical industry, the food industry, and an endless list of other industries and professions were all subject to regulation.

The Internet companies, on the other hand, enjoyed a climate of infinite license.  Since they are based in the U.S., with its almost unlimited free speech, the companies were subjected to few restrictions, and, when challenged, have argued that any further regulation of the information they carried would be an unthinkable violation of the First Amendment.

Europe knew better. As a continent that had been plunged into war due to the uninhibited rise of extremist movements, it understood that not only extremist deeds but also extremist speech and ideologies such as Nazism must be legally banned. Following WWII, Europe legislated against racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, leading to the conviction and penalizing of offenders. This helped keep the extremist blight and its mass influence in check.

The Current Global Jihadi Movement Is Unimaginable Without The Internet.

But even in Europe, all this changed with the rise of the Internet. Internet companies worldwide exploited the legislative vacuum in which the Internet existed to create a supranational system that is above the law. A court could penalize the likes of British Holocaust denier David Irving and French comedian and political activist Dieudonné for anti-Semitic speech, but the material that established their criminal culpability remained freely available on the web to influence others. Extremist groups of all persuasions took advantage of this situation, and online hate speech inciting jihad, racism, xenophobia, and genocidal murder spread like a plague.

Online platforms filled with horrific pictures of beheadings, crucifixions, amputations, burnings, drownings, stonings,  and other forms of execution.[3] Jihadi organizations used the web to recruit supporters and fighters,[4] provide practical instruction and manuals for terror operations including car bomb and ramming attacks,[5] make arch-terrorists into heroic models for emulation,[6] and raise funds for their activity.[7] The Internet provided them with an ideal vehicle for spreading their ideas, even to young children. 

Recently, ISIS schoolbooks, including versions in English, written and used by the organization in its Syrian stronghold of Al-Raqqa, were circulated online via the instant messaging service Telegram – thus making globally available this crucial tool for indoctrinating the younger generation.[8] Terrorist groups' magazines and mouthpieces are also circulated online. Furthermore, some social media provide encrypted platforms, which enable the jihadis to share information safely. 

Extremists on the right have entered the fray as well, filling the Internet with their own hatred for minorities, some even urging to follow the example of "Adolfetto" Hitler and exterminate minority groups.[9]

However, most Internet companies have not seemed to care much about this problem. Hundreds of companies all over the U.S. have hosted terrorist organizations without knowing or caring who their customers were. As for social networks, most of their founders were young people largely devoid of historical consciousness. 

Focusing on their grand vision of a global online community, they were oblivious to the fact that they were also creating communities of terror and transforming scattered terrorist groups into a global jihadi movement. In the name of empowering people everywhere and giving a voice to each and every individual, they also empowered the most vicious elements in the global community – such as a jihadi who appeared on social media holding up a severed head, calling out "Allah Akbar" and preaching jihad and murder. Social media entrepreneurs continued developing this medium without considering the dangers and the need to take measures against them.

The Invalid Excuses Of The Internet And Social Media Companies.

It is important to review the excuses and ploys used by Internet companies to justify their irresponsible conduct. The first corporate ploy was to simply deny responsibility. "True," they said, "we supply the vehicle (and of course reap the revenues), but somebody else provides the content, so direct your accusations at them." While the terrorists should indeed be the prime target, the companies act as their willing accomplices by making their platform available for criminal use.

It should be mentioned that there is a clear precedent for holding carriers of incitement responsible for the results of that incitement. In the mid-1990s, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda sentenced Ferdinand Nahimana, cofounder of the Rwandan radio station Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines, to 30 years in prison for spreading incitement that contributed to the Rwanda genocide. Obviously, I do not mean to compare Nahimana, who identified with and sought to promote the genocidal messages on his radio, to the magnates of social media, who are just demonstrating reckless indifference, but only to stress the principle that carriers of incitement can be held accountable for the consequences of that incitement. This principle was in fact established after WWII, in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 9, 1948, which criminalizes not just the act of genocide but also "direct and public incitement to commit genocide."[16]

In the U.S., too, a district court ruled in 2006 that the First Amendment does not protect the right to disseminate information meant to result in violence. This ruling came in the case of radical animal rights and environmental activist Rodney Adam Coronado, who taught others how to build bombs. "The First Amendment does not provide a defense to a criminal charge simply because the actor uses words [rather than actions] to carry out his illegal purpose," the court stated.[17]

In fact, companies are well aware of their responsibility to limit the use of their platforms, as evidenced by their introduction of "community guidelines" and "terms of use" – which they later used as their second tactical corporate excuse. "We are doing what is necessary by establishing guidelines and community standards," they said.

This is the biggest deception of all. First, the companies are clearly failing to enforce their own guidelines, for had they enforced them, the Internet and social media would not be so full of hate speech and incitement to murder. Moreover, unlike companies that produce yogurt, cars, planes, or pharmaceuticals, and that allow government regulators and even end users access to information about their quality control departments and the experts and technologies they use to safeguard the consumer, Internet companies keep us completely in the dark. This information – access to which is an essential right of consumers and government – is their closely guarded secret. 

We have no idea how many experts they employ to remove hateful content, how proficient they are in Arabic and other relevant languages, what technological processes they use, or, most importantly, what specific criteria they apply. In fact, Twitter noted recently that it was identifying jihadi content using "internal, proprietary spam-fighting tools"[18] – a description that is a bad joke at the expense of innocent victims.

It is not even clear whether the screening mechanisms that companies have pledged to develop are aimed at removing hate speech and incitement. Google recently promised advertisers to "provide simpler, more robust ways to stop their ads from showing against controversial content,"[19] thus implying that such content would be kept away from ads, but not necessarily removed. Likewise, Facebook chairman and CEO Mark Zuckerberg implied in a recent post that his network's ultimate goal is to let users decide what content they will be spared from seeing, instead of categorically removing certain types of content. 

"The idea," he wrote, "is to give everyone in the community options for how they would like to set the content policy for themselves. Where is your line on nudity? On violence? On graphic content? On profanity? What you decide will be your personal settings."

A third corporate dodge was to shift responsibility onto users, an economic idea of absolute genius. Complaints about online content were answered with "Did you flag it?" Hundreds of millions of users were thus pressed into service as unpaid corporate employees. Beyond the chutzpah involved, this method is also ineffective, because flagging by users is only the first step of a process which continues with referral to committees to validate the flagging. These committees are part of an "internal" and "proprietary" process we know nothing about – save for the fact that the material they are supposed to remove remains online. MEMRI has repeatedly flagged accounts of social media companies and reported on the results. Some were removed; many were not.[20]

Finally, one of the companies' most intellectually dishonest arguments is that they are actually assisting law enforcement agencies. By allowing a free Internet, they say, they enable intelligence agencies to discover and track murderous conspiracies. The companies' argument was seconded by commercial companies seeking to profit from the status quo, and by unscrupulous academics.

This argument also fails because, as noted, some companies, such as Telegram, offer encrypted services which the terrorists gratefully use.[21] Additionally and most importantly, even if a few terror cells have been stopped thanks to a free Internet, the impact this has pales in comparison to the online radicalization of generations of young people. Moreover, the excuse of assisting intelligence bodies has never been endorsed by senior intelligence officials, who have always made the cost-benefit calculation that a free-to-incite Internet works to society's detriment. They have not been fobbed off by netting small fry, or even large fry, because they understood that this came at the price of wholesale indoctrination of generations.

What Is Required To Achieve The Goal Of An Internet Free Of Hate Speech and Incitement To Murder.

1. Understanding The Scope Of The Threat And The Need For A Revolutionary Approach To Counter It.

The war against terror has always been conceptualized as a battle against its violent manifestations. This focus has become even stronger since ISIS established its territorial base in Syria and Iraq. This terrorism, however, has ideological and religious roots, and these roots have grown stronger and more widespread since the Internet and social media companies have enabled them to use their resources toward their goals. 

Thus, due to the Internet, terrorism has evolved in recent years from isolated groups to a global phenomenon. The West’s misguided perception of terrorism as a military problem has led them to the belief that overcoming ISIS on the battleground of Syria and Iraq will solve the problem and curb terrorism in the West. However, the combination of the ideological and religious roots with the unlimited power of the Internet will entail that the defeat of ISIS in Syria and Iraq will lead to more –not less – terrorism in the West.

It is a little-known fact that the ideology of ISIS, in the early stages of its violent emergence, focused on enemies within the Islamic world, such as other terrorist organizations, Shi'ites, and others. ISIS represented an historic attempt to recreate a territorial base for radical Islam (the Caliphate). 

Fighting the West was not a priority. Indeed, this was the major difference between ISIS and Al-Qaeda, with the latter focusing on jihad against the West.[22] To this day, the ideology of ISIS is embodied in the call for hijra – immigration to the Caliphate – as the pinnacle of belief. Only those who cannot fulfill this call, because the gates of hijra have been closed by the West and because of the West's attacks on ISIS, are called upon to carry out operations in the West.[23] Hence, once ISIS is defeated in Syria and Iraq, and deprived of its territorial base altogether, the foreign fighters will return home and will attack the West from within, with a vengeance. In this battle, the Internet and the social media will play a major role in the recruitment of Muslim communities in the West to this battle.

This is the reason that the West must adopt a new, revolutionary approach to the role of the Internet and social media, in order to put a stop to its enabling role.[24]

2. Regulating The Internet Through Legislation Is Crucial To Protect Human Lives.  

Read the full story here.

Video - Paul Joseph Watson: "Not ONE single conservative group" is on Twitter's "Trust and Safety Council"

'Advanced Islamist Dictatorship' Turkey is the state with most requests for content blocks on Twitter.

'Advanced Islamist Dictatorship' Turkey is the state with most requests for content blocks on Twitter. (HD).

A report that was prepared by academics of TOBB University has revealed that Turkey, as a country, requested the most content-blocks from social media website Twitter in 2015.

The report, named Basın Özgürlüğü Raporu (Press Freedom Report), shows the number of requests to block certain content that were sent to Twitter by the Turkish state since 2012. Having sent seven requests in 2012 and nine in 2013, the courts and state institutions in Turkey dramatically increased requests with 663 in 2014 and 718 in the first 6 months of 2015, making Turkey the state with the most requests of content blocks on Twitter.

The Press Freedom Report that was published by the Ankara-based Freedom Research Association (FRA) was prepared by two TOBB members of staff, Dr. Burak Bilgehan and Dr. Başak Yavcan.

The report also mentioned that a total of 392 journalists were sued for insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan over the past year. The report says that certain articles under the anti-terror law and the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) have been used as the basis for pressuring journalists. Read the full story here.

To Defeat ISIS We Must Convince Twitter, YouTube to ‘Unfriend’ Terrorists.

To Defeat ISIS We Must Convince Twitter, YouTube to ‘Unfriend’ Terrorists. (Algemeiner).

Eventually, ISIS — the military menace — will be defanged, with or without American boots on the ground. But ISIS’ leadership has ensured that the terror group’s brutal, medieval values and violent Islamist worldview will far outlive the death of their last field commander.

That is due to the diabolical but brilliant marketing strategy that ISIS is deploying in targeting young Muslims.

Leveraging social network giants like Twitter and YouTube, the group paints a seductive picture of a heroic movement, sanctioned by Allah himself, to punish and expel the infidels.

ISIS, Al Shabab, Al Qaeda and their ilk have successfully recruited young potential fighters from across the Middle East, Europe and Asia and have used the Internet to lure teenage girls from the United Kingdom—urging them to swap their western lifestyles to join the struggle to establish a global Islamic Caliphate. They have also inspired and trained — online — lone wolf terrorists who are then convinced to murder and maim their neighbors in Western democracies.

Beyond killing or capturing their leaders, the burgeoning threats from ISIS and other terror groups will only subside if their online marketing capabilities are challenged and degraded.

At this stage the answer does not lie in more government legislation or intervention. No one wants more Big Brothers snooping in our lives.

What the world needs now are for the social networking giants like Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook to unfriend the terrorist enablers, recruiters, and teachers.

Teenagers in England shouldn’t so easily be able to communicate with a frontline ISIS fighter in Syria.

Muslim kids in France shouldn’t be circulating tweets celebrating the two Charlie Hebdo murderers as “heroes,” a mere two hours after the Islamist terrorists were gunned down by French police.

To date, Facebook has been the strongest in taking the lead against terrorists. Twitter has done the least.

How can online providers make a real difference? By doing the following:

– Publishing and adhering to transparent terms of usage.

– Permanently barring repeat offenders.

– Refusing service to groups that openly tout their affiliation with groups identified by the U.S. State Department as terrorists.

– Refusing to publish terrorist training manuals and videos online.

There are those who argue that such moves will only drive the evildoers underground. “Better to allow them to operate in the open, so that U.S. Homeland Security, MI5, German and French Intelligence can more easily track the activities”, they say.

But such policies have only enabled Islamist extremists to impact more and more young Muslims around the corner — and around the world. 

Intelligence and law enforcement awareness that potential terrorists are out there did not stop the Charlie Hebdo Islamist murderers or extremists from Phoenix bent on shooting up an anti-Islamist gathering in Texas.

In recent months, I have met with senior intelligence and government officials in France, Germany, and in Asia. They fear more lone wolf attacks; they are already being forced to track more young extremists. 

They all say that to defeat terrorists’ online campaigns short of deploying privacy-killing, draconian “Big Brother” tactics, democracies need help from the ultimate experts in predictive behavior– not the CIA—but Google, YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook.

There are life and death issues at stake.

During a recent conference in Jerusalem, I heard a remarkable speech from a courageous moderate Muslim leader. Imam Hassen Chalghoumi is the President of the Conference of Imams in France.

He is among the very few of 6,000 Imams in France who regularly denounces anti-Semitism. He chose to make his presentation excoriating Islamist extremism in Arabic — a noble, even heroic gesture. But at the end of stirring speech he suddenly switched to French and raised his fist in anger and frustration at the specter of his young constituents increasingly embracing religious extremism: “J’accuse, Twitter! J’accuse, YouTube!”

The Internet did not create hate or terrorism. But it is high time for the collective genius that has given society this powerful tool to help stop terrorists and bigots from hijacking the most powerful marketing and teaching tool the world has ever known before it’s too late. Read the full story here.


Rabbi Abraham Cooper is associate Dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles.

ISIS threatens Twitter employees over 'genocide' on ISIS accounts.

WOW: over 20.000 #IS accounts suspended. @twitter was really busy. Not only #IS accounts but also few #JN accounts (main ones too).
— Elijah J. Magnier (@EjmAlrai) February 27, 2015

ISIS threatens Twitter employees over 'genocide' on accounts.(TheGuardian).

Isis supporters have threatened Twitter employees, including co-founder Jack Dorsey specifically, with death over the social network’s practice of blocking accounts associated with the group.

In an Arabic post uploaded to the image-sharing site JustPaste.it, the group told Twitter that “your virtual war on us will cause a real war on you”. It warned that Jack Dorsey and Twitter employees have “become a target for the soldiers of the Caliphate and supporters scattered among your midst!”

“You started this failed war … We told you from the beginning it’s not your war, but you didn’t get it and kept closing our accounts on Twitter, but we always come back. But when our lions come and take your breath, you will never come back to life.”

Twitter’s terms of service explicitly ban “direct, specific threats of violence against others”, and the company has followed YouTube in proactively shutting down Isis-related Twitter accounts, with the aid of the UK’s counter-terrorism internet referral unit. Hmmm.....The fact they resort to threatening means they're hurting big time.... 'we have nothing to fear but fear itself'  Read the full story here.

No wonder @twitter is closing #IS accounts. Now #IS is threatening @twitter openly pic.twitter.com/XKjHRR8c5y
— Elijah J. Magnier (@EjmAlrai) March 1, 2015

Related: 

Resistance from Activist Da'Wa Networks in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany

Twitter go's 'Sharia' compliant.

Twitter go's 'Sharia' compliant. (Twitter).

Why Might Content Be Withheld?

If you have encountered a Tweet or an account that has been marked as withheld, you may be wondering what that means and why that may have happened. With hundreds of millions of Tweets posted every day around the world, our goal is to respect our users' expression, while also taking into consideration applicable local laws.

Many countries, including the United States, have laws that may apply to Tweets and/or Twitter account content. In our continuing effort to make our services available to users everywhere, if we receive a valid and properly scoped request from an authorized entity, it may be necessary to reactively withhold access to certain content in a particular country from time to time.

We have found that transparency is vital to freedom of expression. Upon receipt of requests to withhold content, we will promptly notify affected users unless we believe we are legally prohibited from doing so (for example, if we receive an order under seal).

We also clearly indicate within the product when content has been withheld. And, we have expanded our partnership with Chilling Effects to publish not only DMCA notifications but also requests to withhold content -- unless, similar to our practice of notifying users, we are legally prohibited from doing so.

We strongly believe that the open and free exchange of information has a positive global impact, and that the Tweets must continue to flow.   Hmmmm.......'NO Blasphemy', I wonder if Twitter could give one example of a non Islamic country requesting content to be withheld ?Read the full 'Sharia law' story here.

Maybe user growth isn't everything for Twitter after all http://t.co/7yjSsttycf $TWTR analysis by the @ftlex team
— Sarah Laitner (@sarahlaitner) February 6, 2015

Twitter's transparency report of the second half of 2014 made Turkey the champion of the world in removal requests. https://t.co/nea9SWoMOK

— Peter Nut (@nipped) February 6, 2015

Twitter refuses to disclose user identity To Turkey to protect freedom of expression.

Twitter refuses to disclose user identity To Turkey to protect freedom of expression.(TZ).

Twitter, the phenomenal microblogging website, is on Turkey's agenda mainly because the government is waging a war on the anonymous whistleblower Fuat Avni (@fuatavnifuat), but the resilience Twitter has shown in protecting user information is not only limited to cases in Turkey, the company says.

Nu Wexler, from Twitter's public policy communications department, told Today's Zaman that Twitter has never shared any user information with the Turkish government, as stated in the transparency reports of the company on its website. These reports display information about government requests to Twitter, including how much information a particular government asks for. In the first half of 2014 only, Turkey requested content removal with 65 court decisions as well as the user information of 24 accounts.

Wexler says Twitter does not comment specifically on individual accounts for privacy and security reasons, but they have legal guidelines for certain information that requires court decisions. "Our transparency report shows we have never turned over private user data to the Turkish government," said Wexler. In a recent example, Turkey asked Twitter to remove the account of the BirGün daily. Read the full story here.

Twitter ‘source of all evil’: top Saudi cleric

Twitter ‘source of all evil’: top Saudi cleric. (CapFM).

The microblogging site Twitter popular among both men and women in ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia is nothing more than “a source of lies” and evil, the kingdom’s top Muslim cleric said.

“If it were used correctly, it could be of real benefit, but unfortunately it’s exploited for trivial matters,” Sheikh Abdul Aziz al-Sheikh said on his “Fatwa” television show broadcast late Monday.

Twitter is “the source of all evil and devastation”, the mufti said.

“People are rushing to it thinking it’s a source of credible information but it’s a source of lies and falsehood.”

Saudi Arabia adopts a strict version of Sunni Islam, including a segregation of the sexes, that influences all aspects of life in the Gulf kingdom. Hmmm.....Twitter finally made all the way to the top.

Twitter Sues the U.S. Government

Twitter Sues the U.S. Government. (Wapo).

It seems to be a one-way street for the U.S. government when it comes to privacy, and Twitter’s not cool with it. 

The company filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government on Tuesday stating that the company’s First Amendment rights were violated by the Justice Department’s restrictions on what they could publically reveal about the government’s request for user data. They want more transparency than is currently permitted in their biannual reports.

“It’s our belief that we are entitled under the First Amendment to respond to our users’ concerns … by providing information about the scope of U.S. government surveillance,” said Ben Lee, a Twitter vice president. 

“We should be free to do this in a meaningful way, rather than in broad, inexact ranges.” As it stands, tech firms can only report a broad number of requests, instead of an exact number. Read more at the Washington Post.

'Advanced Democracy' - Most censored content in Turkey are political messages on Twitter.

'Advanced Democracy' - Most censored content in Turkey are political messages on Twitter.(Pirate).

Recently an article on Bianet revealed that the most censored content in Turkey are political messages on Twitter. With 14 accounts and their over 5,000 tweets (along with 500,000 follower statistics) suspended geographically only in Turkey, government criticism is limited on Twitter.

The non-political Twitter accounts, that are suspended, vary from those that leak information about the military and those that have sexual content (partner-finding networks). A total of hundreds of thousands of tweets in the end do not get audience in the users in Turkey that do not have VPN, TOR or use proxy servers.

The most intriguing part of the censorship is that the most rapidly handled accounts are those that leak information about the government’s alleged corruption involving hundreds of billions of euros. Of course a global corporation like Twitter cannot be trusted to respect people’s freedom of speech or right to acquire knowledge, and with this decision to suppress political criticism and information leaks Twitter has sent a clear message to those who use it for all kinds of political communications.

For comparison, perhaps it might be effective to see Twitter’s or the Turkish government’s response to online hate speech or the abatement of hate crimes. There is none… Neither the government nor Twitter are taking initiatives to combat these problems, and when people are attacked for their identities, in most cases some government official congratulates the perpetrator, or else just nod and approve silently.

Right now Turkey has won yet another gold medal in the censorship Olympics by being the country that has demanded the most content removals from Twitter in the first quarter of 2014. Previously, in 2013, Turkey had won similar gold medals from Google as well as maintaining a notorious relationship with Facebook involving cooperation to suppress digital freedoms.

The new regulations and preparations do not cite what methods will be used to surveil student media and social media. However, in certain crowds parallels are being drawn between real-time censorship, interventions and surveillance, and the recently revealed NetClean software purchase.Read the full story here.

Guest Author: – this article does not necessarily represent the opinions of the Pirate Times or Pirate Parties International Gurkan Ozturan Pirate Party Turkey gurkanozturan@korsanparti.org

Twenty Nine Turkish Twitter users on trial while Turkey hosts key UN Internet summit.

Twenty Nine Turkish Twitter users on trial while Turkey hosts key UN Internet summit. (AmnestyInt).

The Turkish government’s prosecution of Twitter critics is a deeply hypocritical stance for the host of the Internet Governance Forum, Amnesty International said today. The organization called on future hosts to set a better example while highlighting violations of Internet freedom by the US, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia and Viet Nam.

The event, which takes place in Istanbul between 2 and 5 September, brings together governments and civil society to share best practice on Internet regulation, security and human rights. Twenty-nine Twitter users are being tried in Izmir, Turkey, and face up to three years in jail for posting tweets during last year’s protests that the authorities claim “incite the public to break the law”. None of the tweets contained any incitement to violence.

“It’s astounding to see Turkish authorities plough on with the prosecution of Twitter critics, even as they host a discussion on Internet governance where human rights are a key theme,” said Sherif Elsayed-Ali, Deputy Director of Global Issues at Amnesty International.

“Such double standards on freedom of expression online are a particularly bitter irony for the dozens of Turkish Twitter users facing trial for tweeting about last year’s protests.”

The 29 are the latest in a long line of government critics prosecuted or convicted for their social media posts.

29 women and men in the city of Izmir, Turkey, are being prosecuted for sending tweets during last year’s protests across the country.

All 29 people are being accused of “inciting the public to break the law” and could face up to three years in prison.

Three of them are also accused of ‘insulting’ the Prime Minister, who is named as a victim in the case.

The tweets provided information such as locations where the police were using force against demonstrators, passwords for available wireless networks in the protest area, or contained opinions and messages of support for the demonstrations. None of the tweets contain any incitement to, or indication of participation in, violence.

No evidence presented in court points to criminal conduct that is not protected under international human rights standards on the right to freedom of expression. Three hearings have already taken place.

The prosecution suggests authorities aim to discourage others from using social media in a country where Twitter was briefly blocked earlier this year. If imprisoned Amnesty International would consider all 29 individuals prisoners of conscience.Read the full story here.

Twitter posts to be blurred to eliminate ‘malicious content,’ minister says.

Twitter 'Iranian' 'Turkish style.

Twitter posts to be blurred to eliminate ‘malicious content,’ minister says. (HD).

Turkey’s telecommunication authority will pixelate Twitter posts to eliminate “malicious content,” Communications Minister Lütfi Elvan said in a written statement April 17, following talks between the microblogging website’s executives and Turkish officials in Ankara.

“We have reached a consensus to ‘neutralize’ malicious content that is the object of court decisions by pixelating. [Twitter executives] also said the presence of a lawyer representing them would contribute to solving the current issues,” Elvan said in the statement.

He confirmed that Twitter had not made any final decisions regarding other subjects, including the opening of a company office in Turkey.

“During the meeting, the opening of a liaison office in Turkey to ensure closer coordination, as well as the conferring of authority for ‘super tagging’ to Turkey’s telecommunication directorate [TİB] was discussed.

But Twitter executives said they would not immediately decide on these issues and could reconvene after assessing it in a meeting at their headquarters,” Elvan said in the statement.

He also said the meeting reflected the “good will” of both sides. “We have agreed to keep in touch in the future to solve possible problems that can arise quickly and effectively,” he added.

Elvan claimed that Twitter executives had issued assurances that over 200 pieces of content had been deleted and five court orders executed in line with the Turkish authorities’ demands.

He also added that Twitter had prepared a complaint application method to report problematic content, also translated into Turkish, and vowed to be more “meticulous” in the future regarding fake accounts.


Related:  Turkey's main opposition applies to top court for the annulment of Internet Law

AKP party says Turkish court’s decision to lift Twitter ban wrong .

AKP party says Turkish court’s decision to lift Twitter ban wrong .(Taz).

Turkish Constitutional Court's decision to unblock Twitter is wrong, according to Huseyin Celik, the deputy head of ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Celik said this decision serves the interests of Twitter, but not the Turkish people, TRT Haber TV channel quoted him as saying on April 10.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan earlier said the fact that Turkish authorities accept the Constitutional Court's decision on lifting the Twitter ban in the country, does not mean that they respect that decision.

On March 21, Turkey blocked the access to Twitter. The access was blocked a few hours after Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a statement about such a possibility.

Turkish media outlets reported that Turkey demanded Twitter delete the tweets that are against Turkish statehood, however the company has not yet responded.

Two years ago over 350,000 tweets, inciting anti-Semitism in France, were removed by Twitter in accordance with the French government's decision.

Turkish Transport and Communications Ministry said on April 3 that access to Twitter is being restored in the country.

Turkey's Constitutional Court reviewed the appeal regarding the blocking of Twitter and assessed this as a violation of users' freedom of expression and made decision to lift the ban on Twitter.

Hmmm.....I want to point out this 'Conversation' by a Salafi sheik on Democracy: "democracy and Islam are incompatible", "Democracy Stipulates that Man Is Above Allah – Which Is Blatant Heresy", "the Islamic shari'a is the sole source for legislation." Sounds familiar to anyone in Turkey?

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu comments on Twitter ban.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu comments on Twitter ban. (Taz).

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu appeared to endorse Turkey's Constitutional Court's ruling on Wednesday that the Twitter ban be restored Anadolu Agency reported

Responding to reporters in New York after the UN Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) group of friends session, Davutoglu said, "court orders need to be respected everywhere across the world."

He added Turkey had asked Twitter to restrict access to the accounts that violated people's rights, however, Twitter refused to do so.

"The Twitter ban was a temporary measure and it does not aim to restrict freedom of expression," he added.

Davutoglu added that Turkey is making progress to normalize relations with Israel, which have been tense since nine Turks aboard a Gaza-bound aid flotilla were killed by Israeli soldiers in 2010.
Israel's apology to Turkey last year marked the beginning of improvement of relations. Turkey is expecting "positive developments" in the coming days on its second requirement - compensation to the families - Davutoglu said. The third demand from Turkey is the lifting of the Gaza blockade.

Asked whether Turkey was at war with Syria, Davutoglu said, "Turkey's borders have been violated many times...Turkey shot down a Syrian military jet three weeks ago. That is why this is an extremely serious matter that needs to be followed by Turkey," he said.

Davutoglu said he would seek support for Turkey's bid to become a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council for the term 2015 and 2016 during his visit in New York.
Turkey served as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council in 2009 and 2010.
Five permanent members of the council are; U.K. U.S., China, France, Russia. The 10 non-permanent seats are filled by members of the UN General Assembly, with five countries elected each year for two years.

Secret Military Contractors Will Soon Mine Your Tweets.

Secret Military Contractors Will Soon Mine Your Tweets.(DefenceOne).

The Army wants a contractor to conduct detailed social media data mining to “identify violent extremist influences” around the world that could affect the European Command, responsible for operations in Europe as well as Iceland, Israel, Greenland and Russia.

Though the project is classified Secret, an Army contract shop in Europe posted a wealth of information on the FedBizOps contract website Tuesday.Read the full story here.

Twitter aiding spread of Jihadi Magazine INSPIRE - For The First Time – Magazine Released Via Twitter – Circumventing Problems Of Release On Jihadi Forums.

Twitter aiding spread of Jihadi Magazine INSPIRE - For The First Time – Magazine Released Via Twitter – Circumventing Problems Of Release On Jihadi Forums.HT: Memri.

'Inspire' Magazine Issue XI – First Issue Released Via Twitter – Review And Analysis: AQAP Praises Use Of Twitter, Reiterates Strategies Of Lone Wolf Jihad, Bringing Down U.S. Economy By: Steven Stalinsky and R. Sosnow* 

Introduction. On May 30, 2013, jihad supporters on Twitter disseminated links to Issue XI of Inspire, the English-language jihadi magazine produced by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).[1]
The issue includes threats to the American people by the group's military commander Qassim Al-Rimi; and in it, AQAP attempts to capitalize on the Boston and London attacks to incite further attacks. Most of the articles in this issue of the magazine focus on the Boston Marathon bombing. Inspire's publishers clearly believe that they deserve credit for providing the Tsarnaev brothers with the motivation and operational know-how for the attack.
More importantly, in this issue, AQAP continues to incite Muslims in the West to carry out similar attacks, by emulating the brothers as well as the perpetrators of the May 22 Woolwich murder and attacks. Thus, featuring prominently in this issue is a message from Al-Rimi warning the American people that these attacks will continue, and that their government is helpless to stop them 
Following the publication of Issue XI, on June 2, an audio warning by Al-Rimi was posted online; in it, he stated that that the Boston bombings revealed the fragility of security, urged Muslims to defend their religion, and said that making bombs such as the ones used in Boston was within "everyone's reach."[3]

For The First Time – Magazine Released Via Twitter – Circumventing Problems Of Release On Jihadi Forums In contrast to all previous issues of Inspire, which were published on Al-Qaeda-affiliated jihadi forums, this issue was published via Twitter, with a link for downloading it tweeted by a number of Twitter accounts. 

 This Twitter release circumvented the main problem that had plagued the publication of previous issues of Inspire – that is, subsequent and intermittent removal of the jihadi forums. Twitter is referred to and praised, and tweets are cited, multiple times in Issue XI – further evidence that jihadis are becoming increasingly dependent upon it.
The first to tweet a viable link was a Twitter account belonging to one "Muhammad Al-Shammary," @muhammad115599, who wrote that he had received an email with the English and Arabic versions of the magazine, and then tweeted the password for the link. However, before Al-Shammary tweeted links, the first to break the news of the issue's release was Yemeni journalist 'Abd Al-Razzaq Al-Jamal, who is associated with AQAP; he posted excerpts and images from it on his Facebook page.
He also posted on his page links to both the English and Arabic versions of the magazine, but they did not lead anywhere; he attributed this to power outages in Yemen, where he lives. It should be noted that Al-Jamal is featured, and his Twitter account is quoted, in Issue XI: "America violates sovereignty of nations. They carry out Extrajudicial killings. Above that, they exploit children in their lowly intelligence services. Then people talk about America as a state of law. America recruits children below the age of ten. They did this in the targeting of Sheikh Adnan Al-Qadhy."Read the full story here.

"CHANGE" - US Embassy in Cairo runs for the hills, shuts down Twitter feed.

"CHANGE" - US Embassy in Cairo runs for the hills, shuts down Twitter feed.HT: Israelmatzav.Remember the video I showed you on Tuesday of Comedy Central's Jon Stewart taking apart Egyptian President Mohammed Morsy? That video led to a battle on Twitter between the United States Embassy in Cairo and Morsy's office. And that in turn has now led the embassy to shut its formerly active Twitter feed. It has since been reinstated.

"Sorry, that page doesn't exist!" reads the banner atop the site where the @USEmbassyCairo Twitter feed sat until this morning. A cached version of the page shows that the last tweet was a link to the Daily Show's Jon Stewart talking about the Egyptian government's arrest of Stewart's Egyptian doppelganger Bassem Youssef, who was detained and fined by the Egyptian police on the charge of insulting Islam and President Mohamed Morsy.

"It's inappropriate for a diplomatic mission to engage in such negative political propaganda," the official Twitter feed for the Egyptian presidency said on their own feed Tuesday. The Egyptian presidency tweet was directed at the Cairo Embassy, the Daily Show, and Youssef himself.

The Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the political wing of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, has been lashing out at Embassy Cairo repeatedly on its own Twitter feed.

"Another undiplomatic and unwise move by @USEmbassyCairo, taking sides in an ongoing investigation & disregarding Egyptian law and culture," the FJP tweeted Tuesday.

A State Department official told The Cable Wednesday that the decision to take down Embassy Cairo's Twitter page was made by U.S. Ambassador to Egypt Anne Patterson without the consultation of the State Department in Washington. Foggy Bottom is urging Embassy Cairo to put the page back up, lest it appear that the United States is caving to the online pressure. "This not a permanent shutdown. Embassy Cairo considers this to be temporary. They want to put new procedures in place," the official said.
...
UPDATE 12:20 : The Embassy Cairo Twitter feed is back up and running, although the controversial tweet in question has been deleted.

UPDATE: 1:00 : Nuland said at Wednesday's briefing that the Embassy viewed the tweet as a mistake but she defended the State Department's criticism of the Egyptian government on the issue. "We've had some glitches with the way the twitter feed has been managed. This is regrettably not the first time. Embassy Cairo is looking at how to manage these glitches," she said. "They came to the conclusion that the decision to tweet it in the first place didn't accord with post management of the site." What is wrong with the United States these days? Why does it insist on showing weakness to the Arab Muslim world? (Answer: Hussein Obama).Read the full story here.

Twitter is for clowns: Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti

Twitter is for clowns: Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti.(AA).

Saudi Arabia’s Grand Mufti has criticized the social media website Twitter as a “council of clowns” and a place for those who “unleash unjust, incorrect and wrong tweets.”

Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdul-Aziz al-Sheikh made the statements during a speech to Saudi Arabia’s senior religious scholars on Friday, the Saudi-based al-Watan newspaper reported Saturday.

The Grand Mufti argued that most of young people are wasting their time on chatting and using the internet, especially Twitter.

Saudi Arabia has three million Twitter users, more than any country in the Middle East, with a growth rate of 300 percent year-on-year, according to a report by the Social Clinic, a Jeddah-based social media consultancy.

Between 2011 and 2012, the number of Twitter users in the kingdom grew by 3,000 percent. The kingdom accounts for an average 50 million tweets per month most of them written in the Arabic language.

“Saudi Arabia has not been selfish either, with most of the tweets being in Arabic, Saudi Arabia accounts for 30 percent of the global tweets tweeted in Arabic, placing Arabic at the top of the pyramid of the fastest growing languages on Twitter, yes Arabic is the fastest growing language on Twitter,” according to statement published at the consultancy website www.thesocialclinic.com.

The capital Riyadh ranks tenth globally among the cities with most Tweets and is the only Arab city in the top 20 cities, according to the report.

Hmmmm......"Saudi Arabia's Clown Crown Prince Alwaleed bin Talal announced the purchase of a $300 million investment in Twitter."Read the full story here.

Related: Saudi Clowns Sheikhs Tweet Their Fatwas.

Australian army Land Warfare Studies Centre analyst: "Twitter users could be military targets."

Australian army Land Warfare Studies Centre analyst: "Twitter users could be military targets."(TA). Social media users whose use tweets and online posts to comment on a military operation could be regarded as legitimate military targets.
Australian army Land Warfare Studies Centre analyst Chloe Diggins on Thursday said a recent social media war between Israel and Hamas raised complex ethical questions about who was a combatant and therefore a legitimate military target.
A key question was whether such comments constituted an act of war. "If that's the case, this might mean that those using social media in support of military operations are now legitimate targets," she wrote in a blog for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
The Geneva Convention defines legitimate military targets as objects "which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralisation, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military advantage". The convention protects civilians unless they are taking a direct part in hostilities.
"So if social media operators or users engage in the conflict by uploading, downloading, sharing, or otherwise adding to content in any way, they then become actors contributing to hostilities," Ms Diggins said.
"In doing so, civilian social media users lose their protected status and can become legitimate targets."
Ms Diggins said if a country could declare war over Twitter - as Israel did when it announced the start of recent hostilities - who's to say Twitter users could not "fight" in the information space of that war?
"Moreover, who's to say they shouldn’t reasonably expect to become legitimate targets themselves?" she said.Ms Diggins stressed her views did not reflect those of the Australian Defence Force AAP.Hmmmm........30,000 Domestic US Drones..........TWEET!Read the full story here.

French students sue Twitter, call to name and shame anti-Semitic users.

French students sue Twitter, call to name and shame anti-Semitic users.(RT).A French Jewish student union has opened a lawsuit against Twitter that could force the site to hand over the names of anti-Semitic tweeters. Recently the social forum has increasingly been used as a platform to disseminate extremist views.
The Jewish Student Union of France (UEJF) has taken legal action to discover the identity of those social media users who had posted tweets under the hashtag #unbonjuif (#agoodjew) in October.
They seek to prosecute the offending parties under anti-hate speech laws over thousands of offensive images, holocaust jokes and inflammatory messages. A court hearing has been scheduled for January 8 in Paris to deal with the lawsuit.
Although Twitter emphasized that it does not mediate content, the social media site caved under pressure from the student group and consented to remove anti-Semitic tweets flagged by the UEJF. Additionally, it wiped tweets with similar offensive messages about Muslims.
“If we are alerted to content that may be in violation of our terms of service, we will investigate each report and respond according to the policies and procedures outlined in our support pages,” said Twitter in a statement.
At the same time, the company underlined that “we reserve the right at all times (but will not have an obligation) to remove or refuse to distribute any Content on the Services.”
The tweets in question are thought to have been sent from around 60 different computers last month.
The UEJF’s lawyer decried Twitter for not taking the matter seriously when it was initially raised back in October. The association’s president, Jonathon Hayoun, attacked the social media site for “not taking the necessary measures against racism and anti-Semitism when the situation in France has never been so serious.”Read the full story here.