Statement
Stop the suppression
of on-line activities
The Website of the Korean
Ministry of Information & Communication was down
on August 26 for 10 hours because many Korean Netizens
over loaded the website by posting protest messages
on the board and reloading repeatedly the page to voice
their opposition to the proposed legislation of the
Ministry. This type of protest is called a "Virtual
Sit-in." It is a legitimate form of demonstration.
During the protest, some tempered netizens made and
used some Javascript files.
But the government
considered the protest an illegal act. They said, "To
crash the website by using the files is to purposely
obstruct service. So it is illegal."
The Cyber Terror Prevention
Center in the police department investigated Jinbonet
(Korean Progressive Network Center) on August 29 from
2 p.m. to 9 p.m.. The police authorities asked for the
records of users who put special Javascript programming
files on the bulletin board of Jinbonet and the people
who downloaded the files. In addition, they asked for
Jinbonet's Hard Disks. However, Jinbonet refused to
give out the hard disks which contain information about
innocent netizens. After an hour fight, the police and
Jinbonet compromised by checking the log files and copying
them in the office.
As many of you know,
Jinbonet does not record user's IP addresses. This is
because the organization has defended user privacy since
it was established in 1998 to help social organizations
to support independent on-line activities. So far, Jinbonet
has had threats from many Investigation agencies asking
for user information. But their attempts seldom succeeded.
To inspect the hard disks which contain information
of not only the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions,
Korean Women's Group United, Green Korea United but
also many users can be regarded as censuring over on-line
activities, and if many hard disks were to be confiscated,
the Jinbonet could not exist. In the past, when other
social organizations had inspections, in addition to
information, keyboards, computer monitors and other
things were taken away.
We have to ask how
serious this problem is. From today's lesson, we can
say that even a small excuse can be reason enough
for them to investigate us. The proposed legislation
on establishing Communication Order is one of the laws
that will legalize these inspections. So far, we have
discussed this law during public debates about stopped
the monopolization by the Ministry. From now on, people's
opinions will be publicity available via the government's
home page. This means that we have the right to know
and this is the first step forward satisfying our demands.
Also we have the right to demonstrate on-line just like
we have this right outdoors. This is our right!!!
From today's incident,
Jinbonet has once again experienced the restrictions
of on-line activities that the government wants, and
we will fight against them no matter what it costs.
So far, we believe that many netizens will support us!!
* Order for the government,
not the people:
The Korean ministry
of Information & Communications must stop supporting
the legislation for establishing the Communication
Order.
* Freedon in name
only:
September, 2000
http://www.jinbo.net |