Protecting Freedom Online: Time for Governments to Join Efforts

Standing up for freedom online is the logical next step to our age-old endeavor for freedom of speech. For centuries, this fundamental freedom has been the driver of democracy. The fight for freedom of speech continues. But in the last decades, it has taken on an extra dimension, that of freedom online. Freedom of speech online is no different from freedom of speech offline. Only now, we are faced with new technological possibilities and challenges.

We are still doing the same, only with different means, and much faster. Protecting freedom online is to safeguard its democratic potential. It is time for governments, companies, ICT experts, the academic community and civil society at large to join efforts.

The internet compresses time and space. News nowadays is flashing on mobile phones in a matter of seconds. Messages on possible election fraud can invigorate a texting crowd within minutes. Where it used to take days to mobilize the masses, protests by so called flash mobs are now organized instantaneously. Online technology is a catalyst which can help people collectively overcome their fear of a totalitarian regime within days.

The Arab Awakening started for a large part online. It will be a permanent force there. But one with many counterforces still. Unfortunately old censorship techniques are still being used massively in some countries, like controlling television channels and printed press. But online technology is making life difficult for the censors. And we should not make their life easier by providing them with filter technology.

Last Sunday, Razan Ghazzawi, a Syrian-American blogger, was arrested by Syrian authorities while travelling to a workshop on media freedom in the Arab World. She had campaigned for the release of imprisoned bloggers and activists in Syria during the ongoing popular pro-reform protests and the violent crackdown by Syrian security forces that followed. Razan was one of the few Syrian bloggers to post under her own name.

Razan’s arrest is a worrying example of how freedom on the net is under increasing threat. As more people use cyberspace to communicate, obtain information, express their views, socialize, and conduct commerce, governments are stepping up their efforts to regulate and control it. Tight control on the internet impinges on our freedom of speech, association and assembly. And it means that violations of other human rights are kept away from us.

The audacity and innovativeness of bloggers and cyber activists like Razan deserves more support. A vibrant civil society assists their cause. As governments, we must also do more. A number of my colleagues, including US Secretary of State Clinton, have shown leadership in defending online freedoms.

The Dutch government is determined step up its efforts to aid cyber activists around the globe. That means supporting back up internet solutions in countries like Syria and Iran. It means providing mesh networks to cyber activists who are unable to access internet otherwise, allowing them to connect freely when communication infrastructure goes down. And it means raising freedom online bilaterally and multilaterally, time and again.

As we have witnessed recently in the Middle East, we must do everything we can, with all partners on board, to ensure that technology from our countries is not abused by repressive governments to suppress online freedoms. One way is to include such technology under the EU dual use regulation, and the Dutch government has requested the European Commission to do so.

Besides individual country initiatives, I believe the time has come for a concerted global effort from our governments to combat censorship and embed digital media freedom. For this reason, I am convening a ministerial conference on Freedom Online on December 8th and 9th in The Hague. The goal is to establish a Coalition of States which will ensure that the internet is open, free, innovative and accessible to all. Multiple stakeholdership is key: it is in the internet’s very DNA. And so the Coalition will engage with the wide field: NGOs, ICT businesses, academia, individuals and governments alike to address the exercise of human rights through the internet.