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Facebook is helping to round up blasphemers, that is to say those who insult or deny islam, and deliver them to justice in Pakistan. By engaging in illegal speech on social media they leave a trail of evidence which the government is able to request and Facebook complies with. The anti-blasphemy laws are also useful in cracking down on dissent in general as the penalty for blasphemy in Pakistan is now death.
In recent months, Pakistan's interior minister, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, has increased pressure on Facebook and Twitter to identify individuals suspected of blasphemy. On 7 July, Facebook's vice-president of public policy, Joel Kaplan, met with Khan to discuss the government's demand that Facebook either remove blasphemous content or be blocked in the country.
On Monday, Facebook confirmed that it had rejected Pakistan's demand that new accounts be linked to a mobile phone number – a provision that would make it easier for the government to identify account holders. Currently, opening a Facebook account in Pakistan requires only an email address, while mobile phone users must provide fingerprints to a national database.
That social media would become the means for a government crackdown on free speech is a bitter twist for platforms that claim to want to increase openness and the free flow of ideas.
The advent of social media once heralded an opening for religious debate in Pakistan. Platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Viber allowed individuals in conservative, rural areas to engage in discussions that were once possible only for students and urban intellectuals, unconstrained by the conservative norms of their communities.
"Until recently, social media afforded a measure of privacy where you could discuss the hypocrisy of people whose behavior was loathsome but who wore the thick garb of piety," said Pervez Hoodbhoy, a prominent academic and activist.
"Now the state is saying that we will track you down wherever you are and however you might want to hide," Hoodbhoy added. "Pakistan is fast becoming a Saudi-style fascist religious state."
The problem with engaging in potentially illegal speech on social media, of course, is that online speech leaves evidence.
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Friday July 28 2017, @10:41AM (5 children)
There's some good stuff in this thread, but the best resource on exactly this question is Data and Goliath [slate.com], a book by Bruce Schneier.
By his taxonomy, there are 4 ways to defeat online tracking:
The linked article gives his summaries.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:23PM (4 children)
Just want to add a footnote in case someone buys Ethernet/WLAN equipment like IP-cameras nowadays..
Make sure your firewall only allows connections out that you explicitly permitted rather than a list of destinations to deny. This is because many devices nowadays will autoconfigure once they get power and phone home. There will be a record and someone will know how to hack into one of your devices from that very moment.
And you will have a hard time to know in advance just what destination your device will try to connect to.
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Monday July 31 2017, @08:53AM (3 children)
Good idea. Wonder if my humble home router is capable of doing that...
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday July 31 2017, @03:22PM (2 children)
First check that you actually have the source code for what it's running etc..
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Monday July 31 2017, @05:10PM (1 child)
I'm ashamed to say you overestimate me -- totally stock router from my ISP, doubtless full of proprietary garbage.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Monday July 31 2017, @05:57PM
Put some other computer as firewall between the fiber/cable/DSL etc and your internal network.