Access Contested: Security, Identity, and Resistance in Asian Cyberspace

Citation

Calvert, P. (2012), "Access Contested: Security, Identity, and Resistance in Asian Cyberspace", The Electronic Library, Vol. 30 No. 3, pp. 444-445. https://doi.org/10.1108/02640471211241708

In almost every country in the world there is a constant battle going on between those who would restrict use of the Internet and those who wish to keep it as open as possible. Possibly nowhere is the contest being harder fought than in Asia. This book on the subject is the work of the OpenNet Initiative, a partnership of institutions that aims to investigate, expose and analyse Internet filtering and surveillance practices in a credible and non‐partisan fashion.

The editors of the book claim that the internet has so far passed through three phases and has entered a fourth. The days of the “open commons” when the internet was largely limited to western and liberal countries, is long gone. The second phase they call “access denied” from 2000 to 2005 featured states such as China and Saudi Arabia erecting filters to block access to information. Deibert and his colleagues edited Access Denied: The practice and policy of global internet filtering (The MIT Press, 2008) to describe this period. The third phase that they call “access controlled” lasted from 2005 to 2010, during which states developed more variable, sophisticated and aggressive means of intervening in the Internet, including registration, licensing, and identity regulations to facilitate online monitoring and promote a culture of self‐censorship. The volume Access Controlled: The Shaping of Power, Rights, and Rule in Cyberspace, edited by Deibert et al. (The MIT Press, 2010) dealt with the third phase. They say the world has now entered the “access controlled” phase in which we will see cyberspace become the terrain over which states, companies, citizens and groups will fight, compete and even collaborate. As an example of this, China has adopted a more assertive foreign policy on cyberspace and is finding some willing partners in its campaigns.

General chapters introduce the topic, emphasising that for every use of new technology that has the potential for individuals to open up society, the state seems to have a response of its own. There are chapters on specific countries, such as Internet censorship in Thailand, cyber attacks on the media in Burma, corporate social responsibility and related freedom of expression in South Korea and India, and almost inevitably, internet governance in China. Malaysia features in two chapters: one on the political blogosphere, one on surveillance and censorship around gender and sexuality.

If read in conjunction with other books such as The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, by Evgeny Morozov (Allen Lane, 2011), this will be a tough and eye opening insight to the real world of the internet battleground. Obviously readers will not agree with all that they find here, but it makes a worth contribution to the debate.