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Facebook begins censoring images of prophet Muhammad

165 points by xkarga00 12y ago

panarky 12y ago
For HN discussion, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8951262 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8951262
quaunaut 12y ago
I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Or put another way: As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world without significant investment that I don't think anyone wants us making after the last couple of times.
- jsprogrammer 12y ago
  Does Facebook have a physical presence in Turkey?
  - 100timesthis 12y ago
    it seems they don't have offices in Turkey[1] [1] https://www.facebook.com/careers#locations https://www.facebook.com/careers#locations
  - gtirloni 12y ago
    They have a .tr domain but I doubt they incorporated there. Facebook Inc. Buyukdere Cad. Maya Akar Center No:100-102 B Blok K:18 Esentepe Istanbul, Turkey tolga.ismen@ismen.av.tr +90-212-2726364 +90-212-2726365
- hnnewguy 12y ago
  >I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. For me at least: it's the idea of making a public pronouncement that you support some political view (because that's easy). Then you do something that, at least on the face of it, goes against that position when there could be business repercussions (because that's hard). Why not just keep your mouth shut?
  - quaunaut 12y ago
    Because this is the real world, and no matter what the internet tells you, nuance matters. I don't like Mark Zuckerberg. I think his business practices regularly register as complete bullshit, and furthermore I can't quite tell what the hell they spend their time doing because since about 2009 Facebook has consistently become more and more of something I don't want anything to do with. But there is not one bit of me that doesn't believe Mark really does support free speech everywhere. He didn't have to say that, but he did. He made that effort, even though he knew it opened his flank. And of course he knew that, because he's not a complete idiot. This is the real world. Where while complying with the law, you protest it, because that's how you act in a civilized society.
    - cryoshon 12y ago
      Compliance with protest equals compliance and a certainty that you will keep complying and eventually grow tired of protesting. "How you act in a civilized society" leads to normalization and eventual acceptance of problems caused by compliance.
      - quaunaut 12y ago
        I just don't see how in the face of 2014's continuation of the Civil Rights movement you can say something like that with a straight face.
      - LLWM 12y ago
        They're only "problems" to you because you disagree with the legitimate democratically elected government of another country.
- jessaustin 12y ago
  ...without significant investment that I don't think anyone wants us making after the last couple of times. A service choosing not to censor, and then potentially being censored in turn by ISPs in another nation, could be costly, sure. It wouldn't seem to be in the same ballpark as a military invasion of another nation? (Honestly though, when has a USA military invasion ever actually been about enforcing ideals?) When this issue was discussed yesterday, I pointed out that it's not Zuck's actions that surprise us, because money. Rather, we're surprised by what he says while taking those actions. It's incongruous to appropriate the rhetoric of freedom while happily making money undermining freedom.
  - roc 12y ago
    Once you've accepted the conceit that Facebook will say and do whatever has the best return, it's hardly incongruous for Facebook to hitch a ride on a free, positive PR train. The only incongruity is on the part of people who believed Zuck when they have plenty of data that they shouldn't.
    - davorb 12y ago
      Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard Zuck: Just ask Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS [Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one? Zuck: People just submitted it. Zuck: I don't know why. Zuck: They "trust me" Zuck: Dumb fucks
- FroshKiller 12y ago
  That is a silly comment. Of course you can and often should break laws you don't agree with, even when you're an individual versus a nation. Or would you be fine complying with sharia because some backwater on the other side of the globe said so?
  - ivraatiems 12y ago
    Would you be fine with being imprisoned/executed for refusing to comply while residing in said backwater? It's not that complying with the law would be noble or right, but it's not really reasonable to expect everyone in a country to be a martyr.
    - FroshKiller 12y ago
      Yes? I feel like you are missing the point. The Friendship Nine broke a law they disagreed with where they lived, they were in the right, and their convictions are finally about to be overturned more than 50 years later. Do you think they shouldn't have broken a stupid law?
      - ivraatiems 12y ago
        That's apples to oranges to sharia law.
        FroshKiller 12y ago
        I disagree, and I'm obviously not going to change your mind, so I'd prefer not to argue any further if that's all right with you.
  - g8oz 12y ago
    They are only complying within Turkey right? The consequence of not complying with local laws you disagree with is being shut out of many countries and not being a global brand.
    - 12y ago
- Zigurd 12y ago
  That depends on whether Facebook has significant operations in Turkey. It's not Facebook's job to deny residents of Turkey access to Facebook, or parts of Facebook. It's the Turkish government's job to balkanize the Internet, with all the bad side effects on the tech industry in Turkey, if that is their desire.
- wahsd 12y ago
  What are you talking about, we love forcing our ideals down other's throats, because it's always easier to criticize and tear down others than to look at the pile of shit behind us.
- panarky 12y ago
  In the worst case, Turkey could ban Facebook. Would they really do that? It's nowhere near certain. Google left China rather than submit to their censorship regime, and the Chinese market is like 18 Turkeys. And if you do remove content, you can make that action transparent on Chilling Effects[1]. Facebook doesn't do that, either. There are alternatives. And if you decide to build censorship tools to stay in the good graces of the regime, then don't say "I am Charlie" while you're doing it. [1] https://www.chillingeffects.org/ https://www.chillingeffects.org/
  - isaacremuant 12y ago
    Most countries, including USA, have "censhorship regimes". They just vary in scope and targeting. Many companies could decide not to operate in USA due to the snooping, gagged court orders, civil rights attacks, selective and repressive law enforcement, etc. I get this is a hard issue to speak in "western" sites because many see it as "us vs them" but let me tell you, I could easily subdivide "us" many times and make your portion "them".
    - vixen99 12y ago
      Which characters' images from history are censored in the West?
      - innguest 12y ago
        It happens all the time with a lot of characters. Most recently, criticism of Chris Kyle (the real life sniper/camper/coward) has been censored on Youtube for offending the sensibilities of pro-war, pro-violence folks.
        panarky 12y ago
        Citation please.
        innguest 12y ago
- blueskin_ 12y ago
  > I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Does Facebook have any offices, servers or employees in Turkey? If not, they aren't required to do a thing. Even if they did, they just don't store that content on those servers (and maybe compartmentalise dealing with such data away from any employees based there) and they're fine. If that wasn't the case, then any random tinpot dictatorship (such as turkey) could make arbitrary things illegal for anyone in the world, and expect compliance from every single person in the world. I'm sure turkey would want anyone in the world they could force to be to be brought under sharia law too, not just facebook. Does that mean we should even if we don't live there and don't visit? I for one, don't think so.
  - chc 12y ago
    Really? I would imagine that just serving the content to Turkish visitors would be enough for Turkey to see it as violating the law and put any servers or employees there at risk.
  - user_0001 12y ago
    >I'm sure turkey would want anyone in the world they could force to be to be brought under sharia law too, not just facebook lol, what are you talking about? I suggest you remove your head from your arse and read a bit more about Turkey
    - blueskin_ 12y ago
      Majority muslim nation, cult of personality, widespread corruption, oppressive government, evidence of rigged elections, suppression of free speech. Seems clear-cut to me.
      - user_0001 12y ago
        <rolleyes>
      - 12y ago
- kyllo 12y ago
  It's not so crazy; imagine you're running a business that operates in both the US and an Arab League nation such as Lebanon. The laws of Lebanon require you to observe a boycott of any products and services that originate in or transit through Israel. Meanwhile the laws of the US forbid you from observing the Arab Boycott of Israel. What do you do? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League_boycott_of_Israel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League_boycott_of_Israel
  - richardwhiuk 12y ago
    Detect where the traffic comes from and apply the law thusly?
    - kyllo 12y ago
      Unfortunately in this case, that won't work if you're a US corporation because the law applies to US corporations globally, regardless of what country the actual operations take place in. So the US law requires that you disobey the foreign law even in the foreign country.
- santacluster 12y ago
  I find this argument hilarious, especially in this context. > you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, have no problem breaking the law in other countries when it suits their bottom line. Primary battlefield: privacy rights. > As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, enforce their puritan values around the world by fanatically censoring all kinds of harmless content (mostly, "boobies") on their services. These companies are clearly willing and able to make both commercial and ideological choices with complete disregard for local laws and values.
  - quaunaut 12y ago
    What country's privacy laws are being broken again? Because I've not heard of it. And your argument about enforcing their values around the world is enforcing THEIR values, not American ones. Yes, their values are influenced by their being American no doubt, but it's facetiously cynical to imply the two are related in any way, shape, or form.
- uptown 12y ago
  "you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently." Isn't that Uber's basic approach?
  - quaunaut 12y ago
    I personally don't have very much faith in Uber's long term business prospects, but that's all for its own discussion. But this is just one of many reasons I do think that way.
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  > Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Yes, you absolutely can. Jurisdiction: As long as you're following the laws of your own country, and you don't plan to live in, visit, or do business in some other country, you have no obligation whatsoever to respect that country's laws. In this case, it sounds like Facebook cares about doing business in Turkey (specifically, continuing to reach the citizens of Turkey).
- dreamweapon 12y ago
  I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. I think you're missing a major point: unless FB has something like a CDN physically located inside of Turkey -- or has some other corporate presence there -- then it is under no legal obligation to comply with its laws (or court orders) whatsoever. The reality is that FB is complying with the Turkish government's requests for no other reason than that it chooses to, because it considers the (perceived) business advantages to be more important than the social and human costs of doing so.
Dirlewanger 12y ago
Just doing what's best for business and keeping costs down, nothing to see here.
- threeseed 12y ago
  It's what is also best for their users. The site would simply be banned if they didn't comply with local laws.
  - dublinben 12y ago
    Would that really be so bad for users in Turkey? Maybe a blanket ban of Facebook and other popular sites would encourage a change in government. This appeasement just enables authoritarian censorship.
    - alphakappa 12y ago
      A change in government because some sites are unavailable? That's ambitious -- we just need to look at China to see how well that idea works.
  - Dirlewanger 12y ago
    And why is it best for their users? Because more users = more money. As I said, business as usual.
- AlexandrB 12y ago
  So much for "disruption".
- UweSchmidt 12y ago
  Quite often, when companies are doing what's best for business and keeping costs down, very notable things are going on. Companies function in a legal, cultural and ethical context, and it can be interesting to view their actions in this light. Wouldn't you agree?
  - 12y ago
criley2 12y ago
I find France's own crackdown on non-protected free speech during and shortly after their legendary march for free speech to be much more ironic than a business obeying local law.
- panarky 12y ago
  The issue is not that Facebook obeys local laws. The issue is Zuckerberg shouting "I am Charlie" while simultaneously building the machinery of censorship. https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101844454210771 https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101844454210771 If you think some censorship is better than an outright ban, fine. I don't agree, but I understand your rationale. But don't build the tools of repression and ride the "I am Charlie" bandwagon at the same time. FB is blocking the same class of content that Charlie Hebdo gave their lives to publish. Zuckerberg n'est définitivement pas Charlie. C'est écœurant.
  - dethstar 12y ago
    The whole I am Charlie thing is full of hypocrites. i.e anyone who talks free speech to promote their agenda.
    - agentultra 12y ago
      The existence of hypocrites does not invalidate the movement. Democracy suffers them and remains a valuable form of governance. It could always be better and we should strive to make it that way. It's unfortunate that hypocrites do raise the noise and wash out the message... we could be doing this better.
  - chc 12y ago
    There is a big difference between the Charlie Hebdo attacks and what Facebook is doing here. Charlie Hebdo wasn't legally censored. They weren't even breaking the law. They were just attacked by people who wanted to shut them up. One can support people's ability to say what they want without fear of mob violence and still not want to break the law.
jdawg77 12y ago
A quick mention of the first comment; true, we Americans can't expect to be able to break the law overseas and get away with it...but, as anybody who's spent time in a Muslim world, etc, or perhaps has a ton of family from that tradition - it's easier to see why Je Suis Charlie could give Facebook a headache. I can't sue a journalist overseas for slander that occured about three years ago and still exists; for the most part, I only recall it as an example of how the "international justice," issue cuts both ways. We have the United Nations for a good reason and in both Costa Rica and another country, some of my best friends worked there. If another country, not the USA, wishes to use an invention of my people (the internet) to crap on me, well, they should also either suffer the consequences of American justice...OR, even better, we should all realize that living in one place doesn't and should never subject one to another place's definition of right and wrong.
matthewmcg 12y ago
I'm curious what the legal consequences to Facebook would have been for ignoring the order. Would the Turkish government have sufficient authority to make local ISPs block the site? Would Turkey fine Facebook? Enforcing any penalty would be a problem. If Facebook has no assets in Turkey, Turkey would need to go after Facebook's assets elsewhere, perhaps in California. U.S. courts probably wouldn't enforce a judgement of a Turkish Court that was at odds with the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution, though the cases on this are mixed. It's also interesting to compare this "graven images takedown" system the U.S.' DMCA takedown system. Here you can post some pretty offensive things on the 'net, but god help you if you post a picture of Mickey Mouse!
- gkya 12y ago
  > Would the Turkish government have sufficient authority to make local ISPs block the site? Yes. This has happened with Twitter during the country-wide protests in summer 2013 and with YouTube when sensitive political conversations were leaked just before presidential elections in march 2014.
lenochang 12y ago
how fb gonna ban pictures that nobody could verify it is him? every person who use his name? or just picture with m* string on it? this is absolutely crazy and very uncommon sense. so the image is him because people claim it is him, but in reality the truth is, it is not him, just bunch of ... perceive it is him.
tomp 12y ago
TL;DR: Facebook prevents images of Muhammad to be seen in Turkey.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
kingkawn 12y ago
We censor hate speech. They regard images of Mohammed to be hate speech.
- TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
  And it's a fairly reasonable argument. The main purpose of publishing these images is to say "fuck you" to Islam. Sure, it's done to protest blasphemy laws and such, but Muslims don't see it as "fuck censorship". They see it as "we hate you".
  - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
    >The main purpose of publishing these images is to say "fuck you" to Islam. // If that were true it would still be entirely lawful (in USA) wouldn't it? I'd certainly argue it's more about criticism of Islam than intention to offend. If you want to silence criticism that uses visualisation then proclaiming the central figures in your ideology to be unlawful to represent in imagery is a perfect way forward.
- theorique 12y ago
  This is mistaken though. It's perfectly permissible under the first amendment. Just because it annoys Moslems in Turkey and other places doesn't mean it must be censored elsewhere.
  - diyorgasms 12y ago
    I think when he says "we," he is probably from Europe, where hate speech laws are much stronger than in America, where they basically don't exist.
    - theorique 12y ago
      Fair point.
- diyorgasms 12y ago
  Yeah, but that's a really stupid attitude. In what way are images of a person inciting hatred or calling people to violence? Denying the Holocaust is a hell of a lot different than saying, "Hey! Look! Here's a picture of a person!"
blueskin_ 12y ago
If you carry out the request of an oppressive government, you are as much a part of it as the people physically performing atrocities. Facebook should be ashamed of themselves.
alphakappa 12y ago
It is silly to expect a company to not comply with local law. Do we expect Facebook to give up its business in the US if it decides tomorrow that it doesn't agree in principle with some aspect of American law? If Facebook was censoring content in America to assuage Turkey, there would be a good reason to gripe about it. It is not doing that.
blfr 12y ago
Blocking access to pages from countries where the court order was issued seems entirely reasonable to me. GitHub does the same[1]. The censorship here is the responsibility of the Turkish government, not Facebook. It's supposedly a democratic country so maybe even represents the will of the people living there. And anyway, when social sites block "objectionable" pages on their own or under criticism, but with no involvement of the legal system, anyone who complains about censorship is quickly shut down with arguments that it's a private company under no obligation to protect free speech. Why expect them to defy sovereign states when they usually can't handle a little outrage on Twitter? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8703650 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8703650
- panarky 12y ago
  A year ago, YouTube and Twitter refused to take down content that the Turkish government didn't like, and they were both blocked. YouTube - http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/google-youtube-ban-turkey-erdogan http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/google-youtube-... Twitter - http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/03/21/turkey-bans-twitter-and-twitter-explodes/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/03/21... I was in Istanbul at the time, and I'm certain the Streisand effect more than offset the censorship, and badly damaged Erdoğan's reputation at home and abroad. Banning popular sites shines a bright light on repression. Resistance can be more effective than collaboration.
- pbhjpbhj 12y ago
  >Blocking access to pages from countries where the court order was issued seems entirely reasonable to me. // Shouldn't you just let that country block for itself what it doesn't want? If you have products available in your country that are unlawful in another then you wouldn't stop individuals from that country from buying them in your country, you'd let the other country police the import, surely? Seems analogous to me.
- dreamweapon 12y ago
  The censorship here is the responsibility of the Turkish government, not Facebook. Sounds like a blanket rationalization that can be applied to virtually any kind of corporate-powered environmental or human rights abuse at the hands of despotic regimes everywhere: "Abusive practice X is the responsibility of government Y, not hapless company Z, which would surely perish if it did it did not bend over and fulfill government Y's every whim and fancy." GitHub does the same. GitHub doesn't put out puffy and patently false statements about being "committed to building an environment where you can speak freely without fear of violence."
SixSigma 12y ago
How do they know what he looks like ?
- cpncrunch 12y ago
  Exactly. The pic in the Charlie Hebdo magazine was just a brown guy with a beard and a (turban?). No mention of Muhammad at all AFAIK.
grandalf 12y ago
Je Suis Pragmatique
discardorama 12y ago
When a company blocks a page in the US due to a US court order: they're a respectable, law-abiding company. When a company blocks a page in another country due to that country's court order: censorship! Where's the freedom of speech?!?! I am an American, but: if my fellow Americans want to see censorship in play, take a look at the fight Al Jazeera had to get into cable networks (especially in the days after 9/11). And they had to start a subsidiary, Al Jazeera America, to get around some hurdles.
- vowelless 12y ago
  > When a company blocks a page in the US due to a US court order: they're a respectable, law-abiding company. Forgive my naivete. Is there precedence for this? Are there pages blocked in the US due to US court orders (and available elsewhere in the world)?
  - nitrogen 12y ago
    See ICE's "Operation In Our Sites" and related domain seizures. See also: DMCA and ContentID abuse.
    - dublinben 12y ago
      As egregious as those are, none are an example of a site being blocked after a court order.
      - discardorama 12y ago
        Well, to be honest, they were blocked even without a court order...
cryoshon 12y ago
From the article: "Just this December, Facebook agreed to censor the page of Russia’s leading Putin critic, Alexei Navalny, at the request of Russian Internet regulators." "Critics have previously accused the site of taking down pages tied to dissidents in Syria and China; the International Campaign for Tibet is currently circulating a petition against alleged Facebook censorship, which has been signed more than 20,000 times." "“I’m committed to building a service where you can speak freely without fear of violence,” Zuckerberg said in his Hebdo statement." The outlandishly egregious doublespeak of Zuck aside, Facebook is a data mining company devoted to making money from its users. The only terms on which it can be said to support free speech are the terms under which it is able to mine user data, then sell user data. In less polite terms, Facebook is a no-limits whore for anyone with cash, so we should expect to see exactly what we are seeing. Here's a question: what are the conditions under which Facebook will censor the content in the US/European market? I guarantee you that it's coming, provided the right topics are being discussed and the right groups are interested in squashing discussion.
- DanBC 12y ago
  > Here's a question: what are the conditions under which Facebook will censor the content in the US/European market? Breast-feeding mothers in Europe and US have had their images removed. EDIT: Not sure if that still happens, but it's easy enough to find articles on WWW about it.
  - panarky 12y ago
    Good piece in The Economist about how Facebook's "arbitrary and capricious" censorship policies are inconsistent, invisible, unaccountable, and affect far more people than, say, the US Supreme Court. Should pages that advocate violence be removed? What if it's political, like "Death to Israel"? http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/08/facebook-censorship http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/08/fa...
    - dublinben 12y ago
      >What if it's political, like "Death to Israel"? Or what if it's in line with official US policy? Like "death to ISIS," or "death to Boko Haram."
JDDunn9 12y ago
What surprises me most about this article is how many censorship requests come out of India. What are they trying to censor?
wtbob 12y ago
Why do they always call him 'prophet' Mohammed? The only people who think that he was a prophet would be Muslims (and maybe B'hais?).
- kl4m 12y ago
  Jesus is called Christ (Messiah) in the media too. It's just part of the vocabulary now, I think.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- dublinben 12y ago
  From a purely practical sense, to distinguish him from the billion other people named Mohamed.
whatsgood 12y ago
i quit facebook 12/31/2014. before doing so i explained to many of my friends and family why i was doing so. every single one of them, no exaggeration, agreed with my reasons, but said they couldn't because of (reason x, y, z). now that ello is patenting their ip i think it is especially important to begin thinking about ways to create public protocols for these type of services. what do you think it would require for most people to give up fb?

165 points by xkarga00 12y ago

For HN discussion, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8951262 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8951262

I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Or put another way: As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world without significant investment that I don't think anyone wants us making after the last couple of times.

jsprogrammer 12y ago
Does Facebook have a physical presence in Turkey?
- 100timesthis 12y ago
  it seems they don't have offices in Turkey[1] [1] https://www.facebook.com/careers#locations https://www.facebook.com/careers#locations
- gtirloni 12y ago
  They have a .tr domain but I doubt they incorporated there. Facebook Inc. Buyukdere Cad. Maya Akar Center No:100-102 B Blok K:18 Esentepe Istanbul, Turkey tolga.ismen@ismen.av.tr +90-212-2726364 +90-212-2726365
hnnewguy 12y ago
>I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. For me at least: it's the idea of making a public pronouncement that you support some political view (because that's easy). Then you do something that, at least on the face of it, goes against that position when there could be business repercussions (because that's hard). Why not just keep your mouth shut?
- quaunaut 12y ago
  Because this is the real world, and no matter what the internet tells you, nuance matters. I don't like Mark Zuckerberg. I think his business practices regularly register as complete bullshit, and furthermore I can't quite tell what the hell they spend their time doing because since about 2009 Facebook has consistently become more and more of something I don't want anything to do with. But there is not one bit of me that doesn't believe Mark really does support free speech everywhere. He didn't have to say that, but he did. He made that effort, even though he knew it opened his flank. And of course he knew that, because he's not a complete idiot. This is the real world. Where while complying with the law, you protest it, because that's how you act in a civilized society.
  - cryoshon 12y ago
    Compliance with protest equals compliance and a certainty that you will keep complying and eventually grow tired of protesting. "How you act in a civilized society" leads to normalization and eventual acceptance of problems caused by compliance.
    - quaunaut 12y ago
      I just don't see how in the face of 2014's continuation of the Civil Rights movement you can say something like that with a straight face.
    - LLWM 12y ago
      They're only "problems" to you because you disagree with the legitimate democratically elected government of another country.
jessaustin 12y ago
...without significant investment that I don't think anyone wants us making after the last couple of times. A service choosing not to censor, and then potentially being censored in turn by ISPs in another nation, could be costly, sure. It wouldn't seem to be in the same ballpark as a military invasion of another nation? (Honestly though, when has a USA military invasion ever actually been about enforcing ideals?) When this issue was discussed yesterday, I pointed out that it's not Zuck's actions that surprise us, because money. Rather, we're surprised by what he says while taking those actions. It's incongruous to appropriate the rhetoric of freedom while happily making money undermining freedom.
- roc 12y ago
  Once you've accepted the conceit that Facebook will say and do whatever has the best return, it's hardly incongruous for Facebook to hitch a ride on a free, positive PR train. The only incongruity is on the part of people who believed Zuck when they have plenty of data that they shouldn't.
  - davorb 12y ago
    Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard Zuck: Just ask Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS [Redacted Friend's Name]: What? How'd you manage that one? Zuck: People just submitted it. Zuck: I don't know why. Zuck: They "trust me" Zuck: Dumb fucks
FroshKiller 12y ago
That is a silly comment. Of course you can and often should break laws you don't agree with, even when you're an individual versus a nation. Or would you be fine complying with sharia because some backwater on the other side of the globe said so?
- ivraatiems 12y ago
  Would you be fine with being imprisoned/executed for refusing to comply while residing in said backwater? It's not that complying with the law would be noble or right, but it's not really reasonable to expect everyone in a country to be a martyr.
  - FroshKiller 12y ago
    Yes? I feel like you are missing the point. The Friendship Nine broke a law they disagreed with where they lived, they were in the right, and their convictions are finally about to be overturned more than 50 years later. Do you think they shouldn't have broken a stupid law?
    - ivraatiems 12y ago
      That's apples to oranges to sharia law.
      - FroshKiller 12y ago
        I disagree, and I'm obviously not going to change your mind, so I'd prefer not to argue any further if that's all right with you.
- g8oz 12y ago
  They are only complying within Turkey right? The consequence of not complying with local laws you disagree with is being shut out of many countries and not being a global brand.
  - 12y ago
Zigurd 12y ago
That depends on whether Facebook has significant operations in Turkey. It's not Facebook's job to deny residents of Turkey access to Facebook, or parts of Facebook. It's the Turkish government's job to balkanize the Internet, with all the bad side effects on the tech industry in Turkey, if that is their desire.
wahsd 12y ago
What are you talking about, we love forcing our ideals down other's throats, because it's always easier to criticize and tear down others than to look at the pile of shit behind us.
panarky 12y ago
In the worst case, Turkey could ban Facebook. Would they really do that? It's nowhere near certain. Google left China rather than submit to their censorship regime, and the Chinese market is like 18 Turkeys. And if you do remove content, you can make that action transparent on Chilling Effects[1]. Facebook doesn't do that, either. There are alternatives. And if you decide to build censorship tools to stay in the good graces of the regime, then don't say "I am Charlie" while you're doing it. [1] https://www.chillingeffects.org/ https://www.chillingeffects.org/
- isaacremuant 12y ago
  Most countries, including USA, have "censhorship regimes". They just vary in scope and targeting. Many companies could decide not to operate in USA due to the snooping, gagged court orders, civil rights attacks, selective and repressive law enforcement, etc. I get this is a hard issue to speak in "western" sites because many see it as "us vs them" but let me tell you, I could easily subdivide "us" many times and make your portion "them".
  - vixen99 12y ago
    Which characters' images from history are censored in the West?
    - innguest 12y ago
      It happens all the time with a lot of characters. Most recently, criticism of Chris Kyle (the real life sniper/camper/coward) has been censored on Youtube for offending the sensibilities of pro-war, pro-violence folks.
      - panarky 12y ago
        Citation please.
        innguest 12y ago
blueskin_ 12y ago
> I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Does Facebook have any offices, servers or employees in Turkey? If not, they aren't required to do a thing. Even if they did, they just don't store that content on those servers (and maybe compartmentalise dealing with such data away from any employees based there) and they're fine. If that wasn't the case, then any random tinpot dictatorship (such as turkey) could make arbitrary things illegal for anyone in the world, and expect compliance from every single person in the world. I'm sure turkey would want anyone in the world they could force to be to be brought under sharia law too, not just facebook. Does that mean we should even if we don't live there and don't visit? I for one, don't think so.
- chc 12y ago
  Really? I would imagine that just serving the content to Turkish visitors would be enough for Turkey to see it as violating the law and put any servers or employees there at risk.
- user_0001 12y ago
  >I'm sure turkey would want anyone in the world they could force to be to be brought under sharia law too, not just facebook lol, what are you talking about? I suggest you remove your head from your arse and read a bit more about Turkey
  - blueskin_ 12y ago
    Majority muslim nation, cult of personality, widespread corruption, oppressive government, evidence of rigged elections, suppression of free speech. Seems clear-cut to me.
    - user_0001 12y ago
      <rolleyes>
    - 12y ago
kyllo 12y ago
It's not so crazy; imagine you're running a business that operates in both the US and an Arab League nation such as Lebanon. The laws of Lebanon require you to observe a boycott of any products and services that originate in or transit through Israel. Meanwhile the laws of the US forbid you from observing the Arab Boycott of Israel. What do you do? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League_boycott_of_Israel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League_boycott_of_Israel
- richardwhiuk 12y ago
  Detect where the traffic comes from and apply the law thusly?
  - kyllo 12y ago
    Unfortunately in this case, that won't work if you're a US corporation because the law applies to US corporations globally, regardless of what country the actual operations take place in. So the US law requires that you disobey the foreign law even in the foreign country.
santacluster 12y ago
I find this argument hilarious, especially in this context. > you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, have no problem breaking the law in other countries when it suits their bottom line. Primary battlefield: privacy rights. > As much as Americans like to act like it, we can't enforce our ideals around the world Facebook, and many American tech companies like it, enforce their puritan values around the world by fanatically censoring all kinds of harmless content (mostly, "boobies") on their services. These companies are clearly willing and able to make both commercial and ideological choices with complete disregard for local laws and values.
- quaunaut 12y ago
  What country's privacy laws are being broken again? Because I've not heard of it. And your argument about enforcing their values around the world is enforcing THEIR values, not American ones. Yes, their values are influenced by their being American no doubt, but it's facetiously cynical to imply the two are related in any way, shape, or form.
uptown 12y ago
"you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently." Isn't that Uber's basic approach?
- quaunaut 12y ago
  I personally don't have very much faith in Uber's long term business prospects, but that's all for its own discussion. But this is just one of many reasons I do think that way.
JoshTriplett 12y ago
> Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. Yes, you absolutely can. Jurisdiction: As long as you're following the laws of your own country, and you don't plan to live in, visit, or do business in some other country, you have no obligation whatsoever to respect that country's laws. In this case, it sounds like Facebook cares about doing business in Turkey (specifically, continuing to reach the citizens of Turkey).
dreamweapon 12y ago
I still find the supposition that Facebook was supposed to defy a court order hilarious. Yes, I understand it's a court order from Turkey, not America, but you can't just flagrantly break the law in other countries simply because yours believes differently. I think you're missing a major point: unless FB has something like a CDN physically located inside of Turkey -- or has some other corporate presence there -- then it is under no legal obligation to comply with its laws (or court orders) whatsoever. The reality is that FB is complying with the Turkish government's requests for no other reason than that it chooses to, because it considers the (perceived) business advantages to be more important than the social and human costs of doing so.

Dirlewanger 12y ago

Just doing what's best for business and keeping costs down, nothing to see here.

threeseed 12y ago
It's what is also best for their users. The site would simply be banned if they didn't comply with local laws.
- dublinben 12y ago
  Would that really be so bad for users in Turkey? Maybe a blanket ban of Facebook and other popular sites would encourage a change in government. This appeasement just enables authoritarian censorship.
  - alphakappa 12y ago
    A change in government because some sites are unavailable? That's ambitious -- we just need to look at China to see how well that idea works.
- Dirlewanger 12y ago
  And why is it best for their users? Because more users = more money. As I said, business as usual.
AlexandrB 12y ago
So much for "disruption".
UweSchmidt 12y ago
Quite often, when companies are doing what's best for business and keeping costs down, very notable things are going on. Companies function in a legal, cultural and ethical context, and it can be interesting to view their actions in this light. Wouldn't you agree?
- 12y ago

criley2 12y ago

I find France's own crackdown on non-protected free speech during and shortly after their legendary march for free speech to be much more ironic than a business obeying local law.

panarky 12y ago
The issue is not that Facebook obeys local laws. The issue is Zuckerberg shouting "I am Charlie" while simultaneously building the machinery of censorship. https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101844454210771 https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101844454210771 If you think some censorship is better than an outright ban, fine. I don't agree, but I understand your rationale. But don't build the tools of repression and ride the "I am Charlie" bandwagon at the same time. FB is blocking the same class of content that Charlie Hebdo gave their lives to publish. Zuckerberg n'est définitivement pas Charlie. C'est écœurant.
- dethstar 12y ago
  The whole I am Charlie thing is full of hypocrites. i.e anyone who talks free speech to promote their agenda.
  - agentultra 12y ago
    The existence of hypocrites does not invalidate the movement. Democracy suffers them and remains a valuable form of governance. It could always be better and we should strive to make it that way. It's unfortunate that hypocrites do raise the noise and wash out the message... we could be doing this better.
- chc 12y ago
  There is a big difference between the Charlie Hebdo attacks and what Facebook is doing here. Charlie Hebdo wasn't legally censored. They weren't even breaking the law. They were just attacked by people who wanted to shut them up. One can support people's ability to say what they want without fear of mob violence and still not want to break the law.

jdawg77 12y ago

A quick mention of the first comment; true, we Americans can't expect to be able to break the law overseas and get away with it...but, as anybody who's spent time in a Muslim world, etc, or perhaps has a ton of family from that tradition - it's easier to see why Je Suis Charlie could give Facebook a headache. I can't sue a journalist overseas for slander that occured about three years ago and still exists; for the most part, I only recall it as an example of how the "international justice," issue cuts both ways. We have the United Nations for a good reason and in both Costa Rica and another country, some of my best friends worked there. If another country, not the USA, wishes to use an invention of my people (the internet) to crap on me, well, they should also either suffer the consequences of American justice...OR, even better, we should all realize that living in one place doesn't and should never subject one to another place's definition of right and wrong.

matthewmcg 12y ago

I'm curious what the legal consequences to Facebook would have been for ignoring the order. Would the Turkish government have sufficient authority to make local ISPs block the site? Would Turkey fine Facebook? Enforcing any penalty would be a problem. If Facebook has no assets in Turkey, Turkey would need to go after Facebook's assets elsewhere, perhaps in California. U.S. courts probably wouldn't enforce a judgement of a Turkish Court that was at odds with the First Amendment in the U.S. Constitution, though the cases on this are mixed. It's also interesting to compare this "graven images takedown" system the U.S.' DMCA takedown system. Here you can post some pretty offensive things on the 'net, but god help you if you post a picture of Mickey Mouse!

gkya 12y ago
> Would the Turkish government have sufficient authority to make local ISPs block the site? Yes. This has happened with Twitter during the country-wide protests in summer 2013 and with YouTube when sensitive political conversations were leaked just before presidential elections in march 2014.

lenochang 12y ago

how fb gonna ban pictures that nobody could verify it is him? every person who use his name? or just picture with m* string on it? this is absolutely crazy and very uncommon sense. so the image is him because people claim it is him, but in reality the truth is, it is not him, just bunch of ... perceive it is him.

tomp 12y ago

TL;DR: Facebook prevents images of Muhammad to be seen in Turkey.

deleted 12y ago

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deleted 12y ago
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kingkawn 12y ago

We censor hate speech. They regard images of Mohammed to be hate speech.

TazeTSchnitzel 12y ago
And it's a fairly reasonable argument. The main purpose of publishing these images is to say "fuck you" to Islam. Sure, it's done to protest blasphemy laws and such, but Muslims don't see it as "fuck censorship". They see it as "we hate you".
- pbhjpbhj 12y ago
  >The main purpose of publishing these images is to say "fuck you" to Islam. // If that were true it would still be entirely lawful (in USA) wouldn't it? I'd certainly argue it's more about criticism of Islam than intention to offend. If you want to silence criticism that uses visualisation then proclaiming the central figures in your ideology to be unlawful to represent in imagery is a perfect way forward.
theorique 12y ago
This is mistaken though. It's perfectly permissible under the first amendment. Just because it annoys Moslems in Turkey and other places doesn't mean it must be censored elsewhere.
- diyorgasms 12y ago
  I think when he says "we," he is probably from Europe, where hate speech laws are much stronger than in America, where they basically don't exist.
  - theorique 12y ago
    Fair point.
diyorgasms 12y ago
Yeah, but that's a really stupid attitude. In what way are images of a person inciting hatred or calling people to violence? Denying the Holocaust is a hell of a lot different than saying, "Hey! Look! Here's a picture of a person!"

blueskin_ 12y ago

If you carry out the request of an oppressive government, you are as much a part of it as the people physically performing atrocities. Facebook should be ashamed of themselves.

alphakappa 12y ago

It is silly to expect a company to not comply with local law. Do we expect Facebook to give up its business in the US if it decides tomorrow that it doesn't agree in principle with some aspect of American law? If Facebook was censoring content in America to assuage Turkey, there would be a good reason to gripe about it. It is not doing that.

blfr 12y ago

Blocking access to pages from countries where the court order was issued seems entirely reasonable to me. GitHub does the same[1]. The censorship here is the responsibility of the Turkish government, not Facebook. It's supposedly a democratic country so maybe even represents the will of the people living there. And anyway, when social sites block "objectionable" pages on their own or under criticism, but with no involvement of the legal system, anyone who complains about censorship is quickly shut down with arguments that it's a private company under no obligation to protect free speech. Why expect them to defy sovereign states when they usually can't handle a little outrage on Twitter? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8703650 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8703650

panarky 12y ago
A year ago, YouTube and Twitter refused to take down content that the Turkish government didn't like, and they were both blocked. YouTube - http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/google-youtube-ban-turkey-erdogan http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/27/google-youtube-... Twitter - http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/03/21/turkey-bans-twitter-and-twitter-explodes/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/03/21... I was in Istanbul at the time, and I'm certain the Streisand effect more than offset the censorship, and badly damaged Erdoğan's reputation at home and abroad. Banning popular sites shines a bright light on repression. Resistance can be more effective than collaboration.
pbhjpbhj 12y ago
>Blocking access to pages from countries where the court order was issued seems entirely reasonable to me. // Shouldn't you just let that country block for itself what it doesn't want? If you have products available in your country that are unlawful in another then you wouldn't stop individuals from that country from buying them in your country, you'd let the other country police the import, surely? Seems analogous to me.
dreamweapon 12y ago
The censorship here is the responsibility of the Turkish government, not Facebook. Sounds like a blanket rationalization that can be applied to virtually any kind of corporate-powered environmental or human rights abuse at the hands of despotic regimes everywhere: "Abusive practice X is the responsibility of government Y, not hapless company Z, which would surely perish if it did it did not bend over and fulfill government Y's every whim and fancy." GitHub does the same. GitHub doesn't put out puffy and patently false statements about being "committed to building an environment where you can speak freely without fear of violence."

SixSigma 12y ago

How do they know what he looks like ?

cpncrunch 12y ago
Exactly. The pic in the Charlie Hebdo magazine was just a brown guy with a beard and a (turban?). No mention of Muhammad at all AFAIK.

grandalf 12y ago

Je Suis Pragmatique

discardorama 12y ago

When a company blocks a page in the US due to a US court order: they're a respectable, law-abiding company. When a company blocks a page in another country due to that country's court order: censorship! Where's the freedom of speech?!?! I am an American, but: if my fellow Americans want to see censorship in play, take a look at the fight Al Jazeera had to get into cable networks (especially in the days after 9/11). And they had to start a subsidiary, Al Jazeera America, to get around some hurdles.

vowelless 12y ago
> When a company blocks a page in the US due to a US court order: they're a respectable, law-abiding company. Forgive my naivete. Is there precedence for this? Are there pages blocked in the US due to US court orders (and available elsewhere in the world)?
- nitrogen 12y ago
  See ICE's "Operation In Our Sites" and related domain seizures. See also: DMCA and ContentID abuse.
  - dublinben 12y ago
    As egregious as those are, none are an example of a site being blocked after a court order.
    - discardorama 12y ago
      Well, to be honest, they were blocked even without a court order...

cryoshon 12y ago

From the article: "Just this December, Facebook agreed to censor the page of Russia’s leading Putin critic, Alexei Navalny, at the request of Russian Internet regulators." "Critics have previously accused the site of taking down pages tied to dissidents in Syria and China; the International Campaign for Tibet is currently circulating a petition against alleged Facebook censorship, which has been signed more than 20,000 times." "“I’m committed to building a service where you can speak freely without fear of violence,” Zuckerberg said in his Hebdo statement." The outlandishly egregious doublespeak of Zuck aside, Facebook is a data mining company devoted to making money from its users. The only terms on which it can be said to support free speech are the terms under which it is able to mine user data, then sell user data. In less polite terms, Facebook is a no-limits whore for anyone with cash, so we should expect to see exactly what we are seeing. Here's a question: what are the conditions under which Facebook will censor the content in the US/European market? I guarantee you that it's coming, provided the right topics are being discussed and the right groups are interested in squashing discussion.

DanBC 12y ago
> Here's a question: what are the conditions under which Facebook will censor the content in the US/European market? Breast-feeding mothers in Europe and US have had their images removed. EDIT: Not sure if that still happens, but it's easy enough to find articles on WWW about it.
- panarky 12y ago
  Good piece in The Economist about how Facebook's "arbitrary and capricious" censorship policies are inconsistent, invisible, unaccountable, and affect far more people than, say, the US Supreme Court. Should pages that advocate violence be removed? What if it's political, like "Death to Israel"? http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/08/facebook-censorship http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2014/08/fa...
  - dublinben 12y ago
    >What if it's political, like "Death to Israel"? Or what if it's in line with official US policy? Like "death to ISIS," or "death to Boko Haram."

JDDunn9 12y ago

What surprises me most about this article is how many censorship requests come out of India. What are they trying to censor?

wtbob 12y ago

Why do they always call him 'prophet' Mohammed? The only people who think that he was a prophet would be Muslims (and maybe B'hais?).

kl4m 12y ago
Jesus is called Christ (Messiah) in the media too. It's just part of the vocabulary now, I think.
deleted 12y ago
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dublinben 12y ago
From a purely practical sense, to distinguish him from the billion other people named Mohamed.

whatsgood 12y ago

i quit facebook 12/31/2014. before doing so i explained to many of my friends and family why i was doing so. every single one of them, no exaggeration, agreed with my reasons, but said they couldn't because of (reason x, y, z). now that ello is patenting their ip i think it is especially important to begin thinking about ways to create public protocols for these type of services. what do you think it would require for most people to give up fb?