Denmark: 3863 sites on censorship list, Feb 2008 – Wikileaks: “Denmark: 3863 sites on censorship list, Feb 2008”

WIKILEAKS PRESS RELEASE Tue Dec 23 01:15:59 GMT 2008

“Denmark: 3863 sites on secret censorship list”

Wikileaks has released the secret Internet censorship list for Denmark. The list contains 3863 sites blocked by Danish ISPs participating in Denmark’s censorship scheme as of February 2008. Danish ISPs “volunteer” to censor their users rather than face legislation and the top three ISPs are particpants.

The system can be used to censor anything, but is meant to be for child pornography sites found by the Danish police and the Danish “Save the Children” group.

The list is generated without judicial or public oversight and is kept secret by the ISPs using it. Unaccountability is intrinsic to such a secret censorship system.

Most sites on the list are still censored (i.e must be on the current list), even though many have clearly changed owners or were possibly even wrongly placed on the list.

The list has been leaked because cases such as Thailand and Finland demonstrate that once a secret censorship system is established for pornographic content the same system can rapidly expand to cover other material, including political material, at the worst possible moment — when government needs reform.

Two days ago Wikileaks released the secret Internet censorship list for Thailand. Of the 1,203 sites censored this year, all have the internally noted reason of “lese majeste” — criticizing the Royal family. Like Denmark, the Thai censorship system was originally promoted as a mechanism to prevent the flow of child pornography.

The Danish filter is maintained by the National High Tech Crime Center of the Danish National Police and Save the Children Denmark. The police department is led by Peter Carpentier, and can be reached by phone: +45 33 14 88 88. The Save the Children-project is led by Kuno Soerensen, +45 25 14 00 69.

The list can be independently tested by any customer of a participating Danish ISP by visiting the URLs of the sites listed. If the customer is presented with a “STOP!” page, the site is still listed in the filter.