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Iranian writer is sentenced to 12 years after tweeting a dot at supreme leader
- DataDive 2y agoAnd if you dare to use Twitter in Brazil, you will be fined a year's salary. ... how authoritarianism shapes public discourse
- OKRainbowKid 2y agoSource? What are the fines for using a banned service in the US?
- SR2Z 2y agoThe only ways for a service to be banned in the US are by court order (i.e. judge says the site has to come down) which carries no penalties for visitors, and sanctions in which case visiting is generally still OK but paying the site is a no-no. In general, users never face fines in the US even for visiting "banned" pages.
- ronsor 2y agoThe US doesn't even block websites. Either the site is taken down (for everyone), or it's up.
- 0xedd 2y ago[dead]
- fsckboy 2y ago>In general, users never face fines in the US even for visiting "banned" pages. You might be oversimplifying. Yes, the US does have particularly free speech, and especially for listening to it. But using kiddie porn sites, president threatening sites, ISIS recruiting sites, US govt leaked secrets sharing sites, perhaps ghost gun or bomb making sites, stalking ex girlfriends... I think a good bit of that has legal consequences for people under many circumstances. Evidence used to convict you is not much different than... evidence.
- Hizonner 2y agoThe only one of those that's illegal just to visit in the US as far as I know is the child porn one, and even that only if you receive or attempt to receive actual child porn, as opposed to some other random content that might be on the site. Some of the things you list are actual criminal acts, not Web sites. Yes, if you stalk your ex, that's criminal, but simply visiting some Web site is not in itself illegal. If there is some US law that might purport to forbid just visiting a Web site, I've never heard of any attempt to enforce it. What the hell is a "president threatening site"? Threats to public officials as a service?
- fsckboy 2y agoif you internet searched "how do you dispose of a body" and then a body is discoved having been disposed of, and you are suspected in the killing, that evidence is introduced at your trial, and a jury will be influenced by it, even though all you did was visit and read the site. That evidence will be even more damning if the page you visited described a particular method that was seen in the case in question. This would be very strong evidence in favor of your guilt. Same for all the other ones I mentioned.
- Hizonner 2y ago... and yet it is not illegal to do that search. You will not be fined, imprisoned, or whatever, for doing the search. The fact that something can, in some circumstances, be evidence doesn't mean it's a crime, and the distinction is absolutely critical in the context we're dealing with here.
- fsckboy 2y agoall of the evidence taken together is what convicts you of a crime. People have been convicted of murder where no body was ever found. You can't point to any piece of the evidence that was used to convict and say "well that was not a crime, so leave it out". My explanation here of how evidence is used in court in gaining convictions is more accurate and realistic than the distinction you are are trying to make.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 2y agoCan you visit a Pro North Korea/ISIS/Iran website? You are kind of paying/circumventing sanctions with potential ad revenue.
- gruez 2y ago>Can you visit a Pro North Korea/ISIS/Iran website? How about the website for Iran's supreme leader[1], with headlines like "ZIONIST REGIME FACES SEVERE CONSEQUENCES FOR ITS ACTIONS"? It's not blocked in the US. [1] https://www.leader.ir/en https://www.leader.ir/en
- LAC-Tech 2y agoThe only thing sensationalist about that headline is "severe consequences"- it is absolutely a Zionist regime though, not even a debatable point.
- ClumsyPilot 2y agoIs that a relevant example? I though US government was separate from Israel’s , thought lately I am less sure!
- gruez 2y agoHow is it not? The original question was asking for a "a Pro [...] Iran website". If the website of the Iranian government doesn't count as "pro Iran", I don't know what does.
- hluska 2y agoIn this case, X is banned in Brazil. Brazil has an entirely different legal framework than the United States.
- mananaysiempre 2y agoReuters, for example[1]: “[Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de] Moraes ordered that those who continued to access X via VPNs be fined up to 50,000 reais ($9,000) per day.” I don’t get how a thing like that could effecrively be ordered into law at a judge’s discretion, but evidently it was. [1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/lula-says-musk-must-respect-brazils-top-court-x-braces-shutdown-2024-08-30/ https://www.reuters.com/technology/lula-says-musk-must-respe...
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- feedforward 2y agoIn 2006, a satellite repairman in New York City was imprisoned for allowing people to watch the television channel al-Manar, which is run by a political party which holds over 10% of the seats in Lebanon's parliament - Hezbollah.
- nradov 2y agoThat's not what happened. Javed Iqbal wasn't imprisoned for allowing people to watch Al Manar. He pled guilty to received payments from Al Manar. Hizbollah is a terrorist organization, regardless of their political status in Lebanon. https://www.justice.gov/archive/usao/nys/pressreleases/December08/iqbaljavedpleapr.pdf https://www.justice.gov/archive/usao/nys/pressreleases/Decem...
- aftbit 2y agoHis name was Javed Iqbal. The charge was "providing material support to Hizballah". He plead guilty and was sentenced to 69 months. The government's story was that: "From approximately 2005 through 2006, IQBAL, through a Brooklyn and Staten Island-based satellite transmission company he helped operate, HDTV Limited, provided satellite transmission services to al-Manar, in exchange for thousands of dollars in payments from al-Manar. IQBAL provided these services knowing that al-Manar is Hizballah's television station."[2] It's hard to work out exactly what this means. Another article[4] does some sleuthing and claims that Iqbal had an FCC licensed earth station that was uplinking in the Ku-band to "ALSAT". That implies that he was actually repeating the al-Manar broadcasts onto a satellite that had a footprint over the US. The Investigative Project on Terrorism links[5] to some documents for the case, including the original indictment[6]. Some of the "overt acts" listed in this indictment included signing a contract in Lebanon in which his company agreed to provide broadcasting services for al-Manar in exchange for a fee. Additionally, he was charged with providing access to these broadcasts to satellite customers. I wonder if he would have gotten in trouble if he had only done the latter - helped consumers to tap into al-Manar without actually being part of the technical broadcast chain. Very interesting case, thanks for the rabbit hole! 1: https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/25/nyregion/25tv.html https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/25/nyregion/25tv.html 2: https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/newyork/press-releases/2009/nyfo042309a.htm https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/newyork/press-releases/200... 3: https://www.justice.gov/archive/usao/nys/pressreleases/December08/iqbaljavedpleapr.pdf https://www.justice.gov/archive/usao/nys/pressreleases/Decem... 4: https://www.tvtechnology.com/news/fbi-raids-backyard-international-teleport-in-staten-island https://www.tvtechnology.com/news/fbi-raids-backyard-interna... 5: https://www.investigativeproject.org/case/190/us-v-iqbal-et-ano https://www.investigativeproject.org/case/190/us-v-iqbal-et-... 6: https://www.investigativeproject.org/case_docs/us-v-iqbal-et-ano/339/indictment.pdf https://www.investigativeproject.org/case_docs/us-v-iqbal-et...
- ignoramceisblis 2y ago--per day. Fined a year's salary per day of use of X/Twitter.
- dyauspitr 2y agoYet there is bipartisan action to ban TikTok in the US. We have effectively banned the import of Chinese electric vehicles. Does that make us authoritarian?
- pino82 2y agoI'm always surprised why I constantly see messages downvoted (not only here), just because they feel unconvenient for the bubble?! Imho you should all stop that. It's too simple. It doesn't really increase credibility. Why not start dealing with actual discussions there, and maybe have a little less "everything was already said; just not yet by everyone" discussions in other places?!
- userbinator 2y agoVPN services are also officially banned in China (except for a small number of exceptions), but everyone who knows even the slightest about tech probably uses one. "It's only illegal if you get caught."
- ClumsyPilot 2y ago> ... how authoritarianism shapes public discourse See I was onboard with this reasoning until last week - we arrested the boss of Telegram and charged him with allowing illicit activity, which obviously happens on WhatsApp and other apps too. Isis was literally recruiting members on western social networks! And we spent months discussing banning of TikTok, my major politicians in mainstream parties. so we aren’t far
- shafouzzz 2y ago[flagged]
- feedforward 2y agoMaybe they'll do a report on the Free Liberty USA passing a law to put Tiktok censoring in their hands.
- washadjeffmad 2y agoI wonder if people realize they've been conditioned into nationalists or if the technology facilitating propaganda is so effective that they don't recognize the rewards and punishments to the amplified talking points they encounter online for what they are. How often does anyone say, "I support censoring China to protect big tech interests and out of fear of what they will learn using methods of data collection that we pioneered and use, but here is why I think that's necessary..." in any discourse on TikTok? And why would they verbalize that when they can just do what worked on them - downvoting until you learn to adopt the right patterns or go away?
- Wytwwww 2y ago> How often does anyone say, Indeed.. how often does anyone say that? Has anyone even said that? Or is that some distorted and dishonest interpretation of something someone might have actually said?
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- hippich 2y agoLook up what for people in Belarus are being locked up daily since 2020. Emojis, likes, simply caught with preview of the news cached on their phone... We call border crossing, either on land or thought airport, a "Belarusian roulette", because your never know... And it is not prominent people, just regular folks. And it is not in completely different culture - it is a very close to western traditions country, right across Poland's border...
- arp242 2y agoI work on an organisation that does anti-corruption reporting. We have some software for that and the search box has "Vladimir Putin, TeliaSonera" as a placeholder example. Few months back a new hire quit on his second day when he saw that, because he was afraid he might get into trouble since he has to regularly travel to Russia (he was from, eh, somewhere in Eastern Europe or the Balkans or some such – I forgot). We had some discussions about whether that was completely paranoid and stupid, or whether it was somewhat reasonable/understandable. I was firmly in the last camp. Yes, maybe the chance of actually suffering consequences is small and in that sense it's paranoid, but people buy lottery tickets with a lower chance of winning. The arbitrariness of it is the point.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 2y agoStifling thought crime does indeed seem best by punishing even trivial offenses. The gestapo cannot be everywhere, so encourage people to self censor or else.
- cqqxo4zV46cp 2y ago[dead]
- quotz 2y agoIf he was from the balkans his reason was definitely false and he just didnt wanna work at your place. We dont have that here, especially not for leaders not from our countries
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- thimabi 2y agoWhat is the message that the dot tried to convey?
- solardev 2y agoWould he have gotten just 6 years if he tweeted a comma instead?
- brendoelfrendo 2y agoThe dot got more "likes" than Khamenei's Tweet. He was able to "ratio" the supreme leader's message without saying anything at all, and apparently the government decided that's worth 12 years in prison.
- Alifatisk 2y agoBut was that really the case? Reading the other comments seem to imply that the article had a baity headline
- brendoelfrendo 2y agoWe should probably read the article rather than the other comments. The article does mention that, while the accused's family is unsure of the exact motive, the arrest happened shortly after the "dot" post. Perhaps it was just the most visible form of dissent that they committed just prior to arrest.
- sn_master 2y agoI believe he was trying to ratio him (and he succeeded).
- smegsicle 2y agotrying to overwrite the hardlink to current directory, typical cybercrime
- cqqxo4zV46cp 2y ago
- forloni 2y ago[flagged]
- colpabar 2y ago[flagged]
- 0xedd 2y ago[dead]
- brendoelfrendo 2y ago"CIA front" is a weird thing to say. It's openly funded by the US Government, so it's not like Radio Free Europe's affiliation is a secret or a conspiracy; we don't need to exaggerate for effect here. Anyway, his lawyer also spoke to a newspaper in Iran, so I think it's hard to argue that he was arrested and tried for something. Whether it was specifically for the dot thing is, I guess, the main thing that one could speculate on, if you were particularly distrustful of the sources.
- thomassmith65 2y agoIt's true if we go back to 1949. It's hardly a bad thing though: RFE provided news from the outside world to those living under Soviet censorship.
- api 2y agoIs the story false?
- christiangenco 2y agoI've been thinking a lot recently about where I would personally draw the line on what sorts of speech should be criminal. If someone publicly called for specific violence (ex: "let's all meet at Joe's house to burn it down—I'll bring the lighter") that feels to me like the sort of thing that would be useful to do something about instead of waiting for the actual crime to be committed. But publicly stating that you support a violent act that somebody else did? Criticizing widely accepted beliefs? Expressing that you don't like a particular sort of person? I don't see how we could possibly criminalize anything like that without neutering the ability for a society to come up with new ideas. Tim Urban's "What's Our Problem" has a great framing of this question: the sort of discourse needed for a high-rung "idea lab" requires that people are about to speak publicly in ways that appear to be "spreading lies online" (one of the crimes Shanbehzadeh, the Iranian writer, was apparently charged with). Without that freedom we all descend into tribal barbarism that leaves us stuck in the current set of ideas we happen to have right now.
- colmmacc 2y agoWhat do you think of a domineering bully who demeans, berates, and manipulates a vulnerable partner? It's not hard to find examples of relationships where over years a person preys on someone else's insecurities and tells them every day that they are worthless, that no-one else will take them, and responds with anger to every minor irritation, often unpredictably. Or they may gaslight them and leave someone with a less sure sense of reality, doubting and undermining themselves. To me, these kinds of injuries are worse than many kinds of physical violence. People who have been extracted from, and recover from, situations like this (as much as anyone can) often say they would have preferred to be beaten. And they don't mean this lightly. This is all "just" speech; the perpetuators and victims often agree that they "never laid a finger on them". But it hardly about beginning or preventing new ideas. In some countries, this kind of speech and pattern of abuse is criminal. But it's not universally so. Should it be? The way these countries frame it is that rights - like freedom of speech - are not absolutely, but must be balanced with the harm they may cause, and to assess things almost case by case with balancing tests. This seems to me a very workable system of law with good outcomes.
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- throw10920 2y agoIt's worth pointing out that similar stuff (although not quite as egregious) is happening in Belarus, Brazil, and even the UK.
- eigenket 2y agoCould you point to something happening in the UK you think is similar to this? Edit: I guess there's this [1] which free-speach maximalists would probably disagree with. Personally I think there's a line between free speech and calls to violence at which point its reasonable to prosecute people. She tweeted calling for people to set fire to buildings where migrants were being housed. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2910vrrygo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2910vrrygo
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- throw10920 2y ago[flagged]
- AlexSW 2y agoCould you link to the particular case you're referring to?
- eigenket 2y agoAre you lying or misinformed? He didn't get 3 years in prison for telling people to go out and protest, he told people to “set fire to all the fucking hotels full of the bastards”. Setting fire to a building full of people isn't a protest, it's attempted murder. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/northampton-bbc-news-southport-defence-reform-b2594106.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/northampton-bbc-...
- boomboomsubban 2y agoI'm not defending Iran over this, I fully expect his imprisonment to be for a reason I would consider bullshit, but this article doesn't present much evidence that the two events in the title have any connection. He tweeted a dot, at some point after was arrested. Technically the article never says the dot is related to the arrest, but it's certainly implied.
- Moorko 2y agoAny opposition who gets arrested will get those allegations by default in Iran. It doesn't mean that those are the real reason. The real reason is exactly what's written there: twitting a dot at supreme leader and getting more likes than him (he previously did say 'If I post a dot, I'll get more like than the supreme leader hahaha'). He was also posting satires about the religion of peace.... :) Source: I'm Iranian.
- feedforward 2y agoIn 2010 there was an international campaign of clemency for an Iranian woman who was going to get the death penalty. The campaign said she was imprisoned for adultery. She was in prison for adultery - and also murdering her husband, with her lover's help. This part was always left out of the news reports on this, at least initially.
- BrandoElFollito 2y agoShe was accused of the murder and acquitted. The stoning to death penalty was for adultery. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/02/iranian-woman-stoning-death-penalty https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jul/02/iranian-woman-...
- parhamn 2y ago> Technically the article never says the dot is related to the arrest, but it's certainly implied. Given the last sentence of the article is "The prosecutor’s office in Ardabil alleged that Shanbehzadeh had been in contact with Israeli intelligence officers and was arrested when trying to leave the country, according to Voice of America." it's not even implied.
- m3kw9 2y agoGot 12 years for a ratio
- 34679 2y agoVoice of America is a US government propaganda outlet that was barred from broadcasting directly to US citizens until the Smith-Mundt Act was amended in 2013. VoA is the primary source for this article.
- mmmBacon 2y agoSeems like you are trying to discredit the source as a way to get people to question the facts. The facts are that this story has been widely reported. It’s well documented that the Iranian government persecutes and foments violence against authors critical to their regime.
- solardev 2y agoThen it should be easy to find an alternative source, right? I don't question the particular facts of this situation, but Voice of America is literally a propaganda outlet. It is not meant to be objective journalism, and was used during the Cold War to counter Soviet propaganda. It should not be cited as a reliable source.
- 34679 2y agoOr maybe I'm just not a fan of war propaganda? I don't care if you question the facts or not. I want you to question the motives.
- LAC-Tech 2y agoI am sure Persia is not a great place to live. But I just cant trust sources like this to not twist and contort things. And I mean at the end of the day they murder a lot less children than other regimes in the area, so it's quantifiably less evil than some middle eastern countries.
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- Dibby053 2y agoBuried under the rest of the article is this, since some people only do headlines I'll copy it here for visibility: >Shanbehzadeh was sentenced to five years for alleged pro-Israel propaganda activity, four years for insulting Islamic sanctities, two years for spreading lies online and an additional year for anti-regime propaganda. >His lawyer, Amir Raisian, told Shargh Network, a reformist newspaper in Iran, that he would appeal the verdict, especially the accusation of pro-Israel activity. The prosecutor’s office in Ardabil alleged that Shanbehzadeh had been in contact with Israeli intelligence officers and was arrested when trying to leave the country, according to Voice of America.
- Moorko 2y agoAnyone opposition who gets arrested will get those allegations by default in Iran. It doesn't mean that those are the real reason. The real reason is exactly what's written there: twitting a dot at supreme leader and getting more likes than him (he previously did say that 'If I post a dot, I'll get more like than the supreme leader hahaha'). He was also posting satires about the religion of peace.... :) Source: I'm Iranian.
- avodonosov 2y agoI sometimes asked people on HN, what news sites they consider to be of decent quality. And npr.org was recommended several times. Seeing this cheap manipulative article suggests they were mistaken. PS. Maybe his 12 years sentence is completely unjust, I don't know. But titles like this... How about "A man is sentenced to death after having cofee for breakfast" for an article about Charles Manson? (I suppose he had cofee sometimes, so formally a true title).
- Moorko 2y ago[flagged]
- bufferoverflow 2y ago[flagged]
- nec4b 2y agoI worry we will soon read about similar things happening in Brazil.