Pakistan Censoring YouTube Goes Wrong
Since I recently wrote about what the data unit at Renesys does, using the recent telecommunication cable breaks as an example, I wasn’t so sure about writing about it again with the news last week. In trying to censor the popular video Web site YouTube, Pakistan inadvertently blocked most of the traffic to the site for a few hours. My coworker Martin provides a nice summary. Now that I’m catching up on my reading from last week, including a list of articles mentioning our company, I’ve found an AP article that brings my job and my Web interests together because it includes interviews with a coworker, Todd, and John Palfrey, the executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society. Anti-Islamic videos resulted in the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority ordering some of Pakistan’s Internet service providers to block access to the site. While Pakistan was only trying to censor YouTube within its borders, the accident makes it easy to imagine how someone could maliciously prevent others from reaching Internet sites. Each day you can get here, be happy.
By the way, YouTube removed one particular video in response to Pakistan’s complaint because the video violates YouTube’s terms of service. Pakistan has since restored access to the site.
