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The Internet Your Rights Online

Japanese Government to Regulate Online Communication 143

Posted by Soulskill from the best-of-luck-with-that dept.
Chris Salzberg writes "The Japanese government made major moves this month toward legislating extensive regulation over online communication. In a series of little-publicized meetings, two distinct government ministries pushed ahead with regulation in three major areas of online communication: web content, mobile phone access, and file sharing. Content regulation will cover anything on the web, including personal blogs and web pages. Upcoming mandatory filtering of mobile phone access is targeted at users under age 18, and will cover chat rooms, forums, bulletin boards and social networking services. File sharing legislation will initially target illegal downloads, but, according to critics, may ultimately broaden to include streaming media from sites such as YouTube."
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Japanese Government to Regulate Online Communication More

Japanese Government to Regulate Online Communication

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  • Sony must be tickled pink.

  • Before anyone cries censorship (Score:4, Informative)

    by dorpus ( 636554 ) on Friday December 28, 2007 @03:57AM (#21837726)
    This is a way to make up for the deficiencies of Japan's legal system. Under the present system, people can post anonymously online , often through the "2ch" bulletin board, to make up false accusations about others, post their financial and medical records online, their bank account numbers, spew racist rhetoric, make death threats, etc. Japanese courts have shown no interest in enforcing the egregious violations of other people's rights. At present, there is a whole subculture of professional losers, the "NEETs" in their 20s and 30s who live at home with their parents and don't work, who spend their lives posting this stuff on the web.

    • Re:Before anyone cries censorship (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Yvanhoe ( 564877 ) on Friday December 28, 2007 @04:06AM (#21837752) Journal
      And this is bad how ?

      Anonymous accusations have no credibility, it would show some maturity in society to just ignore them instead of suing their anonymous authors.

      Anonymous deth threats have no more credibility.

      Racist rethoric is, as far as I know, free speech.

      Posting of financial and medical records are possible only if someone has made a criminal incompetence in a bank or at a medical database. You should sue them instead.

      • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Anonymous accusations have no credibility
        But baseless assertions made under a pseudonym are 100% credible.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Hognoxious ( 631665 )

        Anonymous deth threats have no more credibility.
        Tell that to Benazir Bhutto[1].

        [1] Just in case you're American, she was a former prime minister of Pakistan[2]
        [2] It's near India.
        • O Rly? Big Brother loves you.

          If you're a controversial (or at least targeted) political figure then I guess it doesn't make a difference whether or not you get anonymous online threat of assasination, because you are in danger literally every day. 1984-type environments don't solve that, and it is rather naive to think otherwise. If you're not a targeted political figure/notable person and you are getting anonymous death threats online, you should probably ignore them. Or I will kill you.

          Also, the OP defeat
        • I don't want to be an ass but I'm not sure that anonymous death threats would really be the mitigating factor here, you are talking about a woman in a position of power and authority in a culture that has for quite some time now grown many extremist groups and harbor anachronistic attitudes towards women. I think her assassination was a very real possibility the moment she took office, the anonymity of such threats to do so are kind of a moot point. Its sad that such a thing could be but when people let rel
        • If I and 10000 other people (anonymously) threaten to kill you, but someone completely different guns you down in the street - how does that make fore mentioned death threats credible?

          You know... credible as in I and those other 10000 people could be sued and sentenced? Or even investigated.

          Imagine it like this...
          Say Benazir Bhutto got a anonymous death threat, and police started arresting random people during her political rallies because they "looked suspiciously like someone who might be writing and send

          • credible as in I and those other 10000 people could be sued and sentenced?

            Substitute credible with believable in that sentence - they're more or less synonyms. It doesn't make any sense, does it? It doesn't mean liable. Hint - generally it's not a good idea to use words when you don't know what they mean.

            Credible in the sense that it was threatened, and then it happened. I suppose you'll have no objection to providing your full real name, address, employer and children's schools. Let's have photos too.

            • Credible [reference.com]

              Believable [reference.com]

              Close only counts in horseshoes throws.
              Notice the "Capable of being believed; plausible." line. Or the "to have confidence in the truth, the existence, or the reliability of something, although without absolute proof that one is right in doing so" line?

              You saying that you are wearing a red shirt right now is believable.
              Getting that claim confirmed by an independent, known to be honest and unbiased source would make that claim credible.

              Back to anonymous.
              Above mentioned death threats don't b
        • Death Threats against Bhutto were often public.

          Whichever organization killed her probably announced their intention to do so beforehand.
        • Real classy way to insult americans. Thanks for teaching us a better way to comport ourselves.

        • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward
          If you are going to bash Americans, you need to go full-out.

          Tell that to Benazir Bhutto[1].

          [1] Just in case you're American, she was a former prime minister of Pakistan[2]
          [2] It's near India.[3]
          [3] That's in Asia. [4][8]
          [4] East of Europe[5], North of Africa[6]
          [5] You know, England, France[7], etc
          [6] Where Florida hurricanes[11] and black people come from.
          [7] Ballet, Dijon mustard, and ... oh, never mind, the Eiffel Tower.
          [8] Still not getting it? The Eastern hemisphere[9]
          [9] The other side of the world[11

          • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

            by Anonymous Coward
            > If you are going to bash Americans, you need to go full-out.
            >
            >>Tell that to Benazir Bhutto[1].
            >> [1] Just in case you're American, she was a former prime minister of Pakistan[2]
            >> [2] It's near India.[3]
            > [3] That's in Asia. [4][8]
            > [4] East of Europe[5], North of Africa[6]
            > [5] You know, England, France[7], etc
            > [6] Where Florida hurricanes[11] and black people come from.
            > [7] Ballet, Dijon mustard, and ... oh, never mind, the Eiffel Tower.
            > [8] Still not gettin

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by thelexx ( 237096 )
          Yeah, then we can all end up like this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson [wikipedia.org]

          Afraid to say anything for fear someone will (purposely) misconstrue it and we go to jail.

          Nice try, and thanks for the fear mongering, you condescending bitch.

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by u-235-sentinel ( 594077 )

          Anonymous deth threats have no more credibility.

          Tell that to Benazir Bhutto[1].

          You make a compelling argument there. Death (not deth) threats should always be taken seriously regardless if it's anonymous or not. This should have been investigated and the poster taken to the looney house.


          [1] Just in case you're American, she was a former prime minister of Pakistan[2]
          [2] It's near India.

          Thanks for the Geography lesson. Believe it or not, some of us have moved past Geography 101

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by marcello_dl ( 667940 )
        Besides, people that accept countermeasures acritically can be easily tricked into accepting anything.
        You want to own the internet? first let a bunch of loonies roam it spewing falsehoods and bothering people. I guess many of them could be reported to their ISP and blocked before they learn about anonimity. Then, make some media fuss to augment the perceived scope of their actions, and then, legislate for generic censorship to "save the internet".

      • Just recently in Melbourne a newspaper journalist lifted comments posted on a forum and reported them as fact in a sensationalised article, without confirming or verifying with the authenticity of the comments, when in fact some of the comments on the forum had been made as satire.

        This was then published in Australia's highest selling newspaper.

        People may write unsubstantiated rubbish, but as soon as some lazy journalist finds it and treats it is fact in mainstream media, it can be very damaging for an indi
        • Hmm..
          (A) That terrible person, posting Satire!
          (B) That stupid journalist, not checking his/her facts!
          I go for option (B).

        • Re:A real life bad example (Score:4, Interesting)

          by TapeCutter ( 624760 ) on Friday December 28, 2007 @06:40AM (#21838228) Journal
          "Just recently in Melbourne a newspaper journalist lifted comments posted on a forum and reported them as fact."

          My guess is it's Andrew Bolt in the Herald-Sun, that guy has perfected willfull ignorance as a political tool.

          In Melbourne there are three commercial TV channels, every night of the week two of them run current affairs style programs that are full of advertorials, miracle cures, and other sensationalist bullshit. They are often the prime targets in "Chaser's war on everything" (also from Melbourne).

          • The reporter who wrote the article was actually Annalise Walliker about a dance party. http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,22903261-2862,00.html [news.com.au]

            Which included great "quotes" such as this gem
            Ralph Wiggum reported slabs of Smirnoff spirit-based drinks were selling for $240, and cans of spirits for $10.

            Which I find kind of Ironic when in university she conducted a survey about a problem with the community and journalistic credibility http://fifth.estate.rmit.edu.au/a-credibility-crisis.php [rmit.edu.au]

            • Apparently Australian journalists have never watched the Simpsons before...
              • There is no excuse for that, the Simpsons are on the third commercial channel at roughly the same time as the current affairs shows. We actually do have some real jurno's over here but you won't find them in the Herald Sun.
            • I guessed the right newspaper, just the wrong page. :)

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by NNOP ( 1162249 )
            Yeah Andrew Bolt is a Murdoch stooge. But Melbourne isn't completely bad as far as media goes; The Age is probably the most reputable newspaper in Aus imho. (oh and the Chaser is from Sydney btw)
            • Opps, your right about Chaser. And yeah, the Age is a quality rag.

              As with the UK the best TV news, current affairs, and political satire comes from our two publicly owned stations, go figure!
        • What ever happened to personal responsibility ? Is it so much to ask for? All of this just makes me so sad to think that its better to write a law to take care of such things rather than maybe (in this case) firing the reporters pull shenanigans like this.

      • "Anonymous accusations have no credibility, it would show some maturity in society to just ignore them instead of suing their anonymous authors."

        Come on. The whole problem is that society isn't mature. Would you really trust any future employer or potential girlfriend to look up your name and not even think "what if"? If someone did that to me, you bet I'd want to sue them.

        While I don't necessarily support this particular legislation, I wouldn't have any problem with the government tracking down user

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Yvanhoe ( 564877 )
          Laws intent should be to help the society mature. I would like to see the term "Anonymous coward" become more common use in law (i.e. someone who can't be found and has no legal responsibility) and journalism (i.e. affirmations that he makes must have an intrinsic merit, not be factual).

          The society is indeed not mature at all, but going the easy way just leads to Idiocracy. I guess you will have to explain to your employer or girlfriend what kind of merit these accusations have. And if that fails, nothing

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        First off this is Japan, not the US, so the laws aren't the same, nor is free speech treated the same. Also on this point, don't assume that Japan has as tight of a lock on medical records as the US does.

        I will illustrate with an example.

        I went to the doctor for a cold. Since I am a foreigner, I have to show my Foreigner Registration Card to see the doctor. This card has my work contact information on it. After my visit was over, the doctor contacted my work and told them I had visited and what I was diagno
        • But a bad law is still a bad law. If the problem is public medical records, then you legislate specifically to keep medical records private. If the problem is libelous claims, then you legislate specifically to address them. You do not go and make an attempt to censor the entire Internet. You do not attempt to kill a mosquito with a cannon.

          A lack of lawyers is no excuse. Of course, I'm just saying that because lawyers happen to be the US's #1 export to Japan.
      • Sounds like it could be a field day for lawyers if all this could be regulated and people could sue etc. - sounds like a lot of lawyers could be making a lot money here (who do you think designs new regulations) ... hint to Japan, in overly litigious societies lawyers function in large part as an unnecessary drain on the economy, essentially parasites bleeding the wealth out of out of the productive portions of the economy while contributing little, don't go down that road.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Macka ( 9388 )

        Anonymous accusations have no credibility, it would show some maturity in society to just ignore them instead of suing their anonymous authors.

        So if I were to submit a post accusing you of being a pedophile, siting names, dates, times and places of various misdeeds and degenerate behavior; but did so anonymously, then my accusations would have no credibility? It wouldn't matter that I was making it all up. If I sounded convincing enough for people to believe it then I'd be willing to bet you'd soon chang

        • Really? And what if the person who posted all that information about you got it either by breaking into your house or car,

          Then that's already adequately covered under laws against burglary and data theft. I'm not sure why you think adding yet another law (and one which has enormous additional consequences, at that) would add more protection for the victim in that case.

          or by sifting through your rubbish? Or perhaps your PC got 0wn3d and hacked because you visited a dodgy web site and you're generally cluele

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by rmstar ( 114746 )

            It's not the government's job to protect you from your own stupidity.

            Where from did you get that crazy idea? Of course it is the job of the government to protect people from their own lack of knowledge or experience (that what you so arrogantly call "stupidity"). That is why there are so many regulations and safety laws. Without them, you would have to be a chemist and a microbiologist to avoid getting sick from your food. You would have to be a mechanic not to get killed by a random malfunction of your

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Yes, think of the children.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by bersl2 ( 689221 )
      And this is a better way to fix the system... how? By having Aniue make sure that neither they, nor anybody else, steps out of line? If the judges won't be responsible, why would any other part of the government be?

      • Aniue


        Clever.

        • Aniue

          Clever.

          Indeed, and much better-sounding than what Orwell's translator actually used, which was something sterile (like idai na kyoudai) that didn't capture the 'closeness' of the English original at all. Want to have a go at a revised translation? In Japan, this book needs all the publicity it can get.

    • To be fair a large portion of the complaints about Western countries (especially the US and Britain) operate under the same ideas. The "World is Going to End" ideas seem popular right now.

      In those countries many times things are not decided until a high enough court hears it and lower courts tend to enforce laws passed by the governing body (said governing body doing things it knows will get shot down yet do it anyway, usually because of funding). Unfortunately we see that as every new technology comes out

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Chandon Seldon ( 43083 )

      When a government decides what communication is allowed and what communication isn't and then actively prevents disallowed communication, that is censorship. It doesn't matter what the communication is or what excuses are used to justify the policy - government controlled filters are censorship, and censorship is evil.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by urcreepyneighbor ( 1171755 )

      to make up false accusations about others, post their financial and medical records online, their bank account numbers, spew racist rhetoric, make death threats, etc.

      One of these things isn't like the others! ;)

      How in the bloody hell can you compare spewing racist rhetoric and posting medical records? If someone from the KKK or Kill Whitey wants to blather on and on about the evil black/white race, let him - it's cheap entertainment. No one with a double digit IQ will take them seriously.

      Hell. The Creationist nutjobs are a helluva lot more dangerous than any racist I've come across - but I still would protect their right to make an ass of themselves.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dorpus ( 636554 )
        One of these things isn't like the others! ;) How in the bloody hell can you compare spewing racist rhetoric and posting medical records?

        Simple. What if people post realistic-looking records of you, making you appear as an international sex predator or other criminal?
        What if this has real consequences, such as this information gets sent to your work supervisor, to all your friends, to your university?

        • What if this has real consequences, such as this information gets sent to your work supervisor, to all your friends, to your university?

          Short-term and limited to few single occurrences I agree this to be disasterous. I can't imagine anything better than such stuff happening all the time, though. Being presented with tons of contradicting information from sources of different credibility would force the public to actually begin rating their sources and stop accepting random, unauthorative data as truths.
          Si

    • Nonsense. Censorship to close the society. (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      "This is a way to make up for the deficiencies of Japan's legal system."

      Nonsense. Dangerous nonsense.

      You don't attack subcultures with censorship. This is about ethnic cleansing before the old guard leaves the Diet. Anyone trying to close a society does the same things, censorship is just one of the steps taken.

      It's part of the Lock Down of Japan that is underway. If you don't believe that, you 1. don't live here and 2. don't understand the xenophobia the government is in the process of stoking up.

      - Fin
      • Never been through any of that before. Of course, looking the part helps (after all, if they don't know you're not Japanese, why would they check you?) which is hard to do if you're unmistakably non-Japanese.

        But that bit about the xenophobia is true. I've noticed it. You'd think that they'd want to encourage immigration with their population declining and all that...

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Fred_A ( 10934 )

          But that bit about the xenophobia is true. I've noticed it. You'd think that they'd want to encourage immigration with their population declining and all that...

          That's why robots are so big over there. Once a large segment of the population is made of robots, it becomes easy to check whether the robot is Japanese by checking its serial number.

          And the apparent slow return to the 1920s mentality over there is indeed a bit disturbing. Especially when you see how that turned out (not really taught in western schools for some reason despite it being a large part of WWII)...

      • I think a lot of the government supported xenophobia in Japan is a result of a general lack of societal interest in the government. Sure, almost every democratic style nation has this problem to some degree, but in Japan, it appears to be at an extreme level. No one really seems to care what goes on with the government. I know I'm generalizing a lot here and admit that my research of this topic is shoddy at best, but this is how it appears from my end and talking to friends of mine who have spent a coupl
    • And why should any of that be illegal? And if people want to post their financial or medical records they can go ahead and do that- but they should be prepared for the consequences, especially with that medical record data...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dorpus ( 636554 )
        And why should any of that be illegal? And if people want to post their financial or medical records they can go ahead and do that- but they should be prepared for the consequences, especially with that medical record data...

        If somebody posts your financial and medical records online, do you think they can "go ahead and do that"? Should you be prepared for the consequences and just accept your fate that others can do whatever they want to you?
        • I misread the post and forgot to preview- I thought he/she meant people posting their own (anything will make sense if you're not all that awake or... yeah).

          But I agree with you on that- no one else should be posting your data. However, you should never be in a position where you do not trust whomever else has access to your financial/medical records or suspect that said people may post them online for revenge or for fun or whatever. Something's broken if that is the case, and probably the person that st
    • You don't make up for deficiencies with gross over-applications of big brother.
      Also, death threats don't kill anyone, bothering to police them is a waste of time.
    • it's plain old wartime censorship, pure and simple, that Japan is trying to sneak past its citizens. the dictator's friend returns to the land of the rising sun.

      hint: the new Samizdot is likely to be podcasts, not flimsy typewritten pages passed from hand to hand in a corner of the subway station. to find that, you'll have to also allow no-knock searches at 2 am, jackbooted police thugs, and firing squads.

      now, are you ready for the whole bill of goods?
    • It always gets me how if the United States were to do this people would be quick to cry censorship and how we're being oppressed. And in most cases, rightfully so. I don't want or need to live in a nanny state.

      But then another country, usually some European nation, Japan or China comes along and proposes to do the same exact thing and suddenly people are quick to defend them.

      To be honest, I don't think this is going to be noticed the way it might be in the US. Many countries in Asia are already nanny states
      • To be fair, I think if someone proposed an elimination of 4chan, nobody'd be crying "Oppression!"
    • > This is a way to make up for the deficiencies of Japan's legal system. Under the present system, people can post anonymously online, often through the "2ch" bulletin board, to make up false accusations about others, post their financial and medical records online, their bank account numbers, spew racist rhetoric, make death threats, etc.

      I agree that that's a problem, but why is this the best solution? Don't you think they can do better?

      Anonymous posts can be traced if they're bad. Financial and medic
    • Anything that takes power away from those "professional losers" and "NEETs" should be a good thing. I had it up to here with anime like Genshiken, every poorly-plotted moe anime, and every anime that plays at 1:00am and afterwards only to frustrate normal viewers. The crap that Japan makes; the West (especially the US) had became its dumping grounds for all that crap. And it's understandable that the anime industry want their money back. But I ain't shelling out my hard-earned money on their crap anymor
  • MIAU [miau.jp] just cause of it's name.
    From what I read, I kind of skimmed over the article, this is more of internet regulation law, then internet censorship law. I think some from of such law should exist.

  • Green grass and fences. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "The Japanese government made major moves this month toward legislating extensive regulation over online communication. "

    Hmmm. Is this the point were everyone brags at how much better broadband is overseas?
  • How can this possibly happen, by blocking piracy, blogs, and youtube i would have no reason to go online
    Just a question, can this ban or monitor IRC?
  • I swear I was listening to this song as this article came up in the newsreader.

  • Advice for all governments (Score:4, Funny)

    by sakdoctor ( 1087155 ) on Friday December 28, 2007 @04:50AM (#21837904) Homepage
    Use the AskSlashdot section of this site to find out if your hair brained IT scheme is feasible before suggesting it or spending any money on it.

  • However (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Blice ( 1208832 ) <Lifes@Alrig.ht> on Friday December 28, 2007 @08:53AM (#21838662)
    The Japanese government will NOT be regulating Gundam content.

  • I read the article and after you get passed the first part and down to the "steps" listed you will see that there are several different issues here, but no laws (that I can tell).

    1) The web.
    For the web content it looks like they want to be able to filter at will anything the independent body deems "harmful" but don't forget that they will have to prove its harmful and be able to justify their decisions. I am sure that they will see a lot of input from the educational institutions and rights groups on t

  • This makes perfect sense to me now. You have to control communications when the UFOs and Godzilla invade Japan.
  • Why would Japan target this stuff at those under the age of 18, when official Japanese adult-hood starts at age 20?
    • There's a two-tier legal structure. Government support programs for children and teens end at 18, but full adulthood doesn't begin until 20. 18 and 19-year-olds are in a sort of legal no man's land, receiving neither the protection of a minor nor the rights of an adult. It's a problem.
  • File sharing legislation will initially target illegal downloads

    How do they figure out if a transfer is illegal? Surely people transfer copyrighted materials for many legal reasons. This is always the big problem with these schemes.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Sloppy ( 14984 )
      RTFA; it's amazing. To answer your question: a transfer will be illegal if it's not whitelisted!
  • I don't support this decision by the Japanese government. We've yet to see even one functional Internet content filter.

    -A portion of the material they filter is safe, ie. not supposed to be filtered
    -A portion of the material they should filter goes by unfiltered
    -The filters can be bypassed with the same services a lot of Japanese (and Chinese) Internet users have used for Internet anonymity for a while now

    The first point makes for angry customers who one day can't visit their favorite (safe) pages anymore.
    T
  • Thank god the Gopher underground will still be able to prevail against this censorship.

  • A personal webpage is something you purposefully visit, not something that is being broadcast to you. You have to explicitly request a file from my webserver to get to my personal webpage, which means that you agree to an implied agreement that you do so out of a desire to learn more about me as a person. Therefore, if something I say makes you feel offended, you should simply stop visiting my page. It is as if you ask a person "what do you think about Bush?" and he says "he is a *beep*". If you are a B

  • "Beware those who would deny you Knowledge,
    For in their heart's they dream themselves you Master"

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