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Internet Censorship in Kuwait


Repressive internet censorship law


 

Group censorship...

Kenyan bill require licences to run social media groups


Link Here25th September 2019

A an oppressive censorship bill has been tabled in the Kenyan parliament targeting social media group admins and bloggers.

MP Malulu Injendi has tabled The Kenya Information and Communication (Amendment) Bill 2019 which specifically targets group admins, who will be used to police the kind of content shared in their groups.

The Bill defines social media platforms to include online publishing and discussion, media sharing, blogging, social networking, document and data sharing repositories, social media applications, social bookmarking and widgets. The bill reads;

The new part will introduce new sections to the Act on licensing of social media platforms, sharing of information by a licensed person, creates obligations to social media users, registration of bloggers and seeks to give responsibility to the Kenyan Communications Authority (CA)  to develop a bloggers' code of conduct in consultation with bloggers.

The Communications Authority will maintain  a registry of all bloggers and develop censorship rules for bloggers.

The proposed bill means that all group admins on any social platform will be required to get authorisation from CA before they can open such groups. The bill also states that admins should monitor content shared in their groups and remove any member that posts inappropriate content. The admins are also required to ensure all their members are over 18 years old. Group admins will also be required to have a physical address and keep a record of the group members.

 

 

Update: The Most Dangerous Tweets...

Kuwaiti woman sentenced to 11 years for tweets calling for an end to the unjust regime


Link Here 11th June 2013

A teacher in Kuwait has been sentenced to 11 years in prison for tweets that insulted the country's ruler and encouraged his overthrow.

Huda al-Ajmi received the longest known sentence for online dissent in the Gulf state, according to Kuwaiti opposition groups.

She reportedly faced three separate charges that included insulting the Emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, which carries a one-year sentence in itself. The other two five-year prison terms were given for inciting rebellion against the regime and violating laws on public discussions.

Kuwait has not seen the same scale of pro-democracy uprisings as other Arab states but dozens of people across the Gulf region have been sentenced to jail for Twitter and blog posts in the past year.

Ms al-Ajmi will be able to appeal her three sentences.

 

20th August
2008
  

Update: Kuwait Values Repression...

Kuwait set to finalise bill to censor the internet

After months of planning, Kuwait's Public Prosecutors Office (PPO) is set to finalize a bill that will punish "Internet offenders" in the country.

It seems that constitutional freedoms no longer extend to Kuwait's large (and still growing) population of bloggers. Prosecutor General Hamed Al-Othman said that the bill will criminalize the promotion of immoral conduct, encouraging anti-government sentiments, divulging state secrets, or insulting Islam online. Penalties for breaking the law could involve a 1-year prison sentence (7-years if the insulted party is a minor) and monetary fines.

Speaking of what this new law means for the future of free expression in Kuwait, one blogger told APN this law means two words: shut up. The blogger also noted that most of the Kuwait blogging community is opposing the looming law. This law is a way to control what bloggers publish online; the government wants to know 'who is this blogger?' They want us to shut up so they are free to do anything they want. They can't handle the truth.

The blogger provided a list of tips on their website to help other bloggers stay out of trouble when the new Internet law takes effect. Among the tips is remove the times from comments and leave only dates. As the blogger explains to APN: if I put a comment at 2:03:09 a.m., the government can call all ISP's here in Kuwait and ask for all IP's running at that time. This is more of a safety tip for the commenter than for the blogger. A scheduled publishing system is a way to protect the blogger. For example, if at 8:00 p.m. I am at the cinema and I have a ticket and at 8:10 p.m. Blogger.com publishes my post, nobody can prove that I published the post.

Other tips for bloggers include using symbols or codes to refer to taboo public figures rather than their real names.



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