A report issued by the antifiltering group Peacefire reveals that the Web sites of Amnesty International and other human rights organizations are blocked by the most popular Internet-filtering programs.
The 30 sites listed in the report include those of Amnesty International Israel (blocked by Cyber Patrol), Algeria Watch (blocked by SurfWatch), and Casa Alianza, which documents the dangers facing street children in Central America (blocked by Bess). They were restricted under such categories as “sexually explicit,” “drugs,” “violence,” and “hate speech.”
Peacefire’s Bennett Haselton said that Amnesty International brought the problem to his group’s attention after receiving complaints from students who were unable to access the sites from school. “It’s extremely unfortunate that students in schools across the United States are inadvertently being denied access to portions of Amnesty International Web sites by these software programs,” said Amnesty USA Media Director Karen Schneider. “These students should be lauded—not thwarted—for their efforts to obtain important human rights information.”
Posted December 18, 2000.