In the globalized world, every human being, every region is interconnected. So naturally the humans are also connected. The internet is that key elements which is connecting one country with the other 24/7. But the internet is not just that, the potential is beyond just being a connection. It has become an economy in 21st century. It has become a means of social activism; it has become a means to express the voice on various political and national issues. Who knows in future it may also pave the way for voting through internet and elect the government for a country? But this evolution also comes with challenges. The challenge is censorship of the internet use by the different countries and regions. The restricted use of internet is demeaning its potential.
The internet by its structure is decentralized, but is its use also decentralized?
No
The decentralization is the spirit of democracy and that enables a greater freedom of expression. The internet use must be unmonitored and uncensored so that people can participate freely and the real analysis and judgment of opinions on various issues can be made.
Interestingly, the level of censorship is proportional to the kind of government operates in a country. If it is an autocratic government, the censorship is high where as in a democratic government the censorship is low to moderate.
The reasons to censorship may not be the same for developed, developing and underdeveloped countries. But there are countries where the internet use is not censored, or very less, example Canada. Whereas in Southeast Asia, the freedom of internet use is rapidly degrading. The actualization of freedom of internet use is far from reality.
The authorities have all the reason both technically and non-technically to ban internet use and they will simply say preventive measures. Therefore the time has come to make these authorities answerable and have to make them brief every single technical and non-technical reason.
The freedom score of internet use in India as on 2018 stands at 43 out of 100 and is in the category of partly free.
In India two types of censorship exists. One is active censorship which deals with restrictions on content which is not suitable & used to regulate how the users use the internet. The other one is passive censorship which deals with pornography and betting related content.
The e-surveillance, Internet Kill Switch(IKS), Central monitoring systems(CMS) are the various ways the authorities keep on censoring the content over internet. The CMS pilot program has already blocked blogspot. Cyber security issues may be there, I am not denying that, but the modalities to censor and monitor is quite oppressive in India. The IT Act has been amended and the amended IT Act has become stricter than ever and that gives more power to the authorities who censor the internet use. The authorities in the name law also abuse the power.
The number of shutdowns and banning of internet has been rising steeply in India on year to year basis with 2018 being the worst year. Rajastan and J&K are the two states in India which tops in the number of shutdown by Govt authorities.
In India there various govt funded subsidies for which ID card like Adhaar is attached to the schemes. But Govt is planning to link the Adhaar with social media accounts.
How can this be justified?
Is not that the breach of privacy and data security?
Linking the ID with govt schemes is a different thing, because both are related to Govt. But linking ID like Adhaar card with social accounts like Facebook or Twitter, how can that be justified?
The social sites operate from a different country. Other than that how can the govt do so without taking the consent of the person? Just because they are government does not mean that they will do anything in the name of censorship.
The surveillance of the journalists by Israeli company has surfaced in the public domain recently and for that the Govt has to be answerable. The unlawful things should not be done under the cover censorship.
The constitutional guidelines must be worked upon as far as the internet use is concerned. Simply putting a blanket ban on internet use is not justified. The Govt should be prudent and must act upon seriously on the internet use and the coverage of cyber security must be worked upon appropriately so that the democracy and decentralized voice is not suppressed in the name of law. The internet is a means for free speech in a country. Therefore its use must not be censored.
