Solutions for net companies to behave ethically

Internet sector companies do not respect freedom of expression when operating in repressive countries. For example, the likes of Google, Yahoo and Microsoft all have helped the Chinese government to censor information. Reporters Without Borders proposes six concrete ways to make these companies behave ethically. From Reporters Without Borders:

Content hosts (websites, blogs, discussion forums etc)

US companies would not be allowed to locate their host servers within repressive countries. If the authorities of a repressive country desire the closure of a publication hosted by a US company, they would have to request it under a procedure supervised by the US judicial authorities. Like search engines, content hosts would not be allowed to incorporate automatic filters that censor “protected” key-words.

Internet censorship technologies

Reporters Without Borders proposes two options :

Option a : US companies would no longer be permitted to sell Internet censorship software to repressive states.

Option b : They would still be able to market this type of software but it will have to incorporate a list of “protected” keywords that are rendered technically impossible to censor.