Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance
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Watchdogs Under Watch: Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance BY DON PODESTA April 2015 Watchdogs Under Watch: Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance APRIL 2015 ABOUT CIMA The Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA), at the National Endowment for Democracy, works to strengthen the support, raise the visibility, CONTENTS and improve the effectiveness of independent media development throughout the world. The Introduction . 1 center provides information, builds networks, conducts research, and highlights the indispensable The Spread of Cyber Surveillance . 3 role independent media play in the creation and Cyber Surveillance and the Media . 10 development of sustainable democracies. An important aspect of CIMA’s work is to research ways The Dilemma: Security and Freedom of Expression . 15 to attract additional U.S. private sector interest in and support for international media development. Conclusion . 18 CIMA convenes working groups, discussions, and Endnotes . 19 panels on a variety of topics in the field of media development and assistance. The center also issues reports and recommendations based on working group discussions and other investigations. These reports aim to provide policymakers, as well as donors and practitioners, with ideas for bolstering the effectiveness of media assistance. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Don Podesta is the manager and editor at the Center for International Media Assistance at the National Center for International Media Assistance National Endowment for Democracy Endowment for Democracy. Previously he was an assistant managing editor at the Washington Post, 1025 F STREET, N.W., 8TH FLOOR where he also served as the paper’s news editor and WASHINGTON, DC 20004 PHONE: (202) 378-9700 deputy foreign editor. From 1992 to 1994, he was the FAX: (202) 378-9407 Post’s correspondent in South America, covering Peru’s EMAIL: [email protected] war against the Shining Path guerrilla movement; URL: http://cima.ned.org presidential elections in Bolivia, Chile, and Paraguay; the drug violence in Colombia; and several economic, Mark Nelson social, and environmental issues in Brazil and Argentina. Before joining SENIOR DIRECTOR the Post, he worked as an editor or reporter for the Washington Star, the Minneapolis Star, the Miami Herald and the Arizona Republic. Podesta holds a master’s degree in international affairs from American University’s School of International Service and a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Arizona State University. He is the author of two other ADVISORY COUNCIL FOR THE CENTER FOR CIMA reports, Soft Censorship: How Governments Around the Globe Use INTERNATIONAL MEDIA ASSISTANCE Money to Manipulate the Media (2009) and Business Journalism Thrives— Esther Dyson Craig LaMay Even Under Repressive Regimes (2014). Stephen Fuzesi, Jr. Caroline Little William A. Galston William Orme Suzanne Garment Dale Peskin Ellen Hume Adam Clayton Powell III ABOUT THIS REPORT Jerry Hyman Monroe E. Price Alex S. Jones Rep. Adam Schiff Watchdogs Under Watch: Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance is a joint Shanthi Kalathil Kurt Wimmer publication of Radio Netherlands Worldwide (RNW) and the Center for Susan King Richard Winfield International Media Assistance. RNW, the international broadcaster for the Netherlands, is a multimedia organization aimed at the support of free speech. It targets young people in countries where freedom of expression is severely restricted. RNW uses social media, online platforms, audio, and video to discuss sensitive issues. The right to privacy is often understood as an essential requirement for the realization of the right to freedom of expression. Undue interference with individuals’ privacy can both directly and indirectly limit the free development and exchange of ideas. Big Brother is watching you. — FRANK LARUE, Report to the United Nations, 2013 1 — GEORGE ORWELL, 1984 (Published in 1948) Introduction lectronic surveillance—of e-mail communications, telephone calls, visits to websites, online shopping, and even the physical whereabouts E of individuals—is now pervasive the world over. This has enormous implications for privacy and for freedom of expression and association on the one hand and for national security and law enforcement on the other. Striking the right balance between these fundamental human rights and the need for governments to protect their citizens presents a daunting challenge for policy makers, civil society, news media, and, in the end, just about everybody. For developing countries and those in the media development community, revelations beginning in 2013 about the extent of government surveillance of communications raise serious problems. Some would argue that surveillance by Western governments that preach the gospel of free media smacks of hypocrisy and gives authoritarian governments cover to engage in similar action. Government surveillance makes it particularly difficult for civil society and media-support groups to do their work, especially where media institutions are weak and where freedom of expression is not ingrained in the local culture but rather is seen as a foreign concept. It especially damages Western government programs aimed at promoting Internet freedom worldwide. Watchdogs Under Watch: Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance #mediadev 1 The government of Pakistan, for example, is pushing “back against attempts to curb government surveillance. ‘If the citizens of the United States of America cannot have these rights, how can you?’ is an argument that rights advocates hear way too often,” wrote Sana Saleem, a director of Bolo Bhi, an Internet rights group based in Pakistan, in a blog for the Committee to Protect Journalists one year after massive electronic surveillance by the U.S.’s National Security Agency (NSA) came to light. The Pakistani government, she wrote, “is seeking to replicate a NSA-like model in this country.” 2 Such challenges to freedom of expression and media development around the world require action by democratic governments, civil society, and media organizations. The aim of this briefing paper is to inventory the dilemmas that arise from the growth of electronic surveillance and consider the policy choices to try to address these dilemmas. COUNTRY’S SHARE OF Internet Users by Country (2014) WORLD INTERNET RANK COUNTRY USERS NUMBER OF INTERNET USERS 1 CHINA 21.97% 641.6 M 2 UNITED STATES 9.58% 279.8 M 3 INDIA 8.33% 243.2 M 4 JAPAN 3.74% 109.3 M 5 BRAZIL 3.69% 107.8 M 6 RUSSIA 2.89% 84.4 M 7 GERMANY 2.46% 71.7 M 8 NIGERIA 2.30% 67.1 M 9 UNITED KINGDOM 1.95% 57.1 M 01 FRANCE 1.90% 55.4 M 11 MEXICO 1.74% 50.9 M 12 SOUTH KOREA 1.55% 45.3 M 31 INDONESIA 1.45% 42.3 M 41 EGYPT 1.38% 40.3 M 15 VIETNAM 1.36% 39.8 M 61 PHILIPPINES 1.35% 39.5 M 71 ITALY 1.25% 36.6 M 18 TURKEY 1.21% 35.4 M 19 SPAIN 1.20% 35.0 M 02 CANADA 1.13% 33.0 M 21 POLAND 0.88% 25.7 M 22 COLOMBIA 0.88% 25.7 M 23 ARGENTINA 0.86% 25.0 M 42 SOUTH AFRICA 0.85% 25.0 M AN25 IR 0.76% 22.2 M 26 AUSTRALIA 0.73% 21.2 M 72 MOROCCO 0.69% 20.2 M 28 PAKISTAN 0.69% 20.1 M 29 THAILAND 0.66% 19.4 M 30 SAUDI ARABIA 0.60% 17.4 M 0 100M 200M 300M 400M 500M 600M 700M 800M Source: http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users-by-country/ 2 CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL MEDIA ASSISTANCE CIMA.NED.ORG The Spread of Cyber Surveillance -mails never die. Once sent, they live on—stored on a server somewhere or on the recipient’s computer hard drive from where they can be retrieved. EThey also can be intercepted en route. Phone calls leave records that telecommunication companies keep and are sometimes required to share with government investigators or intelligence services. And of course phone calls, too, can be subject to eavesdropping in real time. Today’s smartphones have geo-location capabilities and depend on communication with cellphone towers, whose locations are also known, making their users’ whereabouts discoverable at all times. Then there’s “the Internet of things,” the increasing digital connectivity of everything from smart watches and health-monitoring devices to kitchen refrigerators, all capturing and sending personal data across the Internet in order to serve up more information and facilitate transactions that consumers want. Of course this data, too, can be monitored. So who wants all this information about individuals? ■■ Governments, especially intelligence services, the military, and law enforcement agencies. ■■ Private companies, including marketers of merchandise and services and providers of online communication platforms, including social media and e-mail. ■■ Hackers and cyber criminals. This paper focuses on the first two—the behavior of governments and private companies in the realm of cyber surveillance and tracking. Addressing the third category—hackers and criminals—would require delving into issues such as identity theft and credit card fraud, which lie beyond the scope of this paper. GOVERNMENT MONITORING As the tools for tracking digital communications become more sophisticated, the consequences for citizens’ privacy and freedom of expression become more critical. In late 2014 Freedom House reported that “more people were detained or prosecuted for their digital activities in the past year than ever before. Since May 2013, arrests for online communications were documented in 38 of the 65 countries studied in Watchdogs Under Watch: Media in the Age of Cyber Surveillance #mediadev 3 Freedom on the Net 2014 , with social-media users identified as one of the main targets of government repression.” 3 That authoritarian governments in countries such as Iran and China monitor their citizens’ activities on the Internet is well known, as are their motives. They may defend these practices as necessary to combat terrorism and crime and maintain social order, but such surveillance is also aimed at keeping themselves in power.