News

Oblation Run in Diliman tickles students' fancies

Photos by Jonathan Cellona, ABS-CBN News
Updated as of Feb 09 12:27 PM

Members of the Alpha Phi Omega (APO) fraternity were at it again. Read more »

UP students go naked in 'Oblation' run

Jonathan Cellona, ABS-CBN News
Updated as of Feb 08 04:09 PM

Members of the Alpha Phi Omega (APO) fraternity conduct their annual "Oblation Run" in front of students at the University of the Philippines Diliman campus on Friday.  Read more »

China deletes 7 million pieces of online info, thousands of apps

Reuters
Posted at Jan 23 08:06 PM

The Cyberspace Administration of China said the crackdown was part of a clean-up of unacceptable and harmful information that started this month. Read more »

Pakistan bans 'bed scenes', 'intimate moments' from TV

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Jan 09 11:02 PM

Pakistani television channels may no longer show "intimate moments between couples" or "bed scenes", the conservative country's media regulator has announced, complaining of too much feminist content and warning that such "bold themes" offend viewers. Read more »

Toe the line: China stamps out foot fetish videos

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Jan 09 10:59 PM

China released new guidelines on censoring short videos Wednesday, prohibiting everything from foot fetishes to spoofing the national anthem, as Beijing continues to clamp down on "harmful" information. Read more »

Vietnam's draconian cybersecurity bill comes into effect

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Jan 01 03:31 PM

Vietnam's new cybersecurity law has received sharp criticism from the US, the EU and internet freedom advocates who say it mimics China's repressive censorship of the internet. Read more »

China's Weibo eyes global expansion, foreign-language products

Talek Harris, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Nov 30 06:27 PM

The Twitter-style platform has long been prominent in China, known for its heavy censorship and Great Firewall, but it now wants to reach Chinese audiences overseas, Weibo Sports senior operations director Zhang Zhe said. Read more »

Google workers want plug pulled on plan for China search

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Nov 28 08:23 AM

Google chief executive Sundar Pichai last month acknowledged publicly for the first time that the company was considering a search engine for China, saying it could offer "better information" to people than rival services. Read more »

Thai proposal for all-powerful cyber agency alarms businesses, activists

Patpicha Tanakasempipat, Reuters
Posted at Nov 16 04:04 PM

Civil liberties advocates, internet companies and business groups in Thailand are protesting the planned legislation, saying it sacrifices privacy and the rule of law, according to interviews and documents reviewed by Reuters. Read more »

China scours social media, erases thousands of accounts

Reuters
Posted at Nov 13 12:35 PM

China's top cyber authority has scrubbed 9,800 social media accounts of independent news providers deemed to have posted sensational, vulgar or politically harmful content on the Internet, it said late on Monday. Read more »

Trade war, censors blow chill wind through China's giant tech scene

Cate Cadell, Reuters
Posted at Nov 13 07:13 AM

China's tech giants are facing a reckoning, with rising state control over the sector, tightening regulation and a biting trade war with the United States stymieing growth. Read more »

Chinese-style 'digital authoritarianism' grows globally: study

Rob Lever, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Nov 01 02:00 PM

The annual Freedom House study of 65 countries found global internet freedom declined for the eighth consecutive year in 2018, amid a rise in what the group called "digital authoritarianism." Read more »

Kuwait activists combat rise in banning of books

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 24 04:34 PM

KUWAIT CITY - In 2014, the Kuwaiti press hailed Gabriel Garcia Marquez as a literary "giant". But since his death, the Colombian writer and a slew of others have been banned as censorship takes root in the Gulf state. Read more »

China mulls censoring online religious content

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 12 12:32 AM

Chinese authorities have drafted sweeping new regulations that would severely restrict religious content online, including images or even descriptions of religious activities from praying and chanting to burning incense. Read more »

Facebook 'terrorism' definition 'overly broad': UN expert

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 03 05:51 PM

Geneva, Switzerland - Facebook's definition of what constitutes "terrorism" is "overly broad" and risks leading to censorship and the arbitrary denial of access to its services, a UN rights expert warned Monday. Read more »

Trump idea on regulating Google 'unfathomable,' analysts say

Rob Lever, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 30 10:56 AM

Legal and media experts say Google and other internet firms enjoy the same constitutional protections on free speech as news outlets, precluding any government interference with the search results that displease the president. Read more »

Will Google bend to China censors?

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 29 02:48 AM

Human rights groups and other advocacy organizations Tuesday urged Google to abandon any plans to craft a censored version of its search engine that could pass muster with regulators in China.   Read more »

Food vlogger accuses 'anti-meat people' of censoring feature on lechon

ABS-CBN News
Posted at Aug 23 07:23 PM

A food vlogger accused "anti-meat people" of mass reporting his episode about Filipino lechon, which resulted in Facebook censoring his video. Read more »

Internet must be 'clean and righteous', Chinese leader tells propaganda officials

Reuters
Posted at Aug 22 10:37 PM

BEIJING - The internet must be "clean and righteous" and vulgar content must be resisted in the field of culture, Chinese President Xi Jinping told a meeting of senior propaganda officials, state media said on Wednesday. Read more »

Google tailoring a search engine for China: report

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 02 10:43 AM

The California-based internet giant has engineers designing search software that would leave out content blacklisted by the Chinese government, according to a New York Times report citing 2 unnamed people familiar with the effort. Read more »