Internet censorship in Thailand and Indonesia (my first-hand experience)
If you keep up with my blog, you'll know that I've lived in Thailand and now Indonesia this past year. Over all, I feel more free than when living in the US and definitely have less concern about the powers of the State.
One thing I have noticed tho, is that these Asian governmental busybodies like to play the role of online big brother and protect you from evil websites.
Now, everyone has heard of the "Great Firewall of China", but what about other, smaller countries.
Indonesia's Censorship
Here's a list of a few notable websites that the all wise, humble and moral government of Indonesia has decided to block.
Reddit - the self-proclaimed Front Page of the Internet at the same time as Vimeo, in May 2014.
Netflix - broadcasts many shows that depict nudity, violence and drug use...frowned upon by the gov
Vimeo - a site-wide ban was given to the popular video hosting/sharing site because of potential videos that depicted pornography.
Imgur - again, porn issues, but much of the site-wide ban has been removed and only particular pages are still banned.
Youtube - while the site-wide ban was also lifted, the government pays close attention to various channels which they feel is too adult oriented.
Redtube, Youporn, etc - porn...i think u get it now.
In 2017, Telegram was blocked, as it was being used to spread "radical and terrorist propaganda", but was then unblocked after several agreements to the government.
Thailand censorship
While there's no official list, 34,411 web sites were blocked by government agencies which cited the following reasons (from wiki):
- lèse majesté content (content that defames, insults, threatens, or is unflattering to the King
- pornography,
- sale of sex equipment,
- threats to national security, which includes criticisms of the king, government or military,
- illegal products and services,
- copyright infringement,
- illegal gambling
Of course you can get around nearly all of this by using a simple, cheap VPN. Suppressing the freedom of speech will not work well for these despots in the long run.
What country are you from? Does your government actively censor your online experience? Leave it in the comments!
Stay free amigos,
Ashe
Yup I noticed this in many Asian countries including Thailand and Indonesia . I’m originally from Czech Republic and I think that it’s one of the best places as far as freedom goes. Czech people constantly challenge government and quite often get their way. But I still wanna see a world of very little if no government before I die. I might be a dreamer but I’m not the only one! Btw I’m thinking of joining you for some time this year. Will be fun bro! Thanks for great article!
ur welcome :)
i did not use reddit but now i now about Reddit i will use it for blog yaah more country have ban the website where people can not access so we use vpn to acces it and Suppressing the freedom of speech! that too bad Indonesia and Thailand government ban the these site!
You forgot to add dailymail.com to your list of blocked Thai websites .......which goes to show that censorship isn't always a bad thing ;-)
Keep living the dream my friend :-)
lol well that's kinda true haha.
Whaaat???? Are you kidding me? YouTube, Reddit, telegram, netfilx? What else do you guys have freely to yourselves then? Damn this is reidculous ...
I think getting a vpn would be better. @surfyogi talked about vpn in one of his latest posts, you can go check it out to see recommended VPNs and their prices.
I come from Nigeria and here we don't have restriction whatsoever on their internet and what we are able to browse through. I feel we have bigger issues at our hands right now than for the government to go looking into what we surf on the internet...lolzz
and I hear that NIgeria has very good and free internet. Is that true?
Hmmm when you say free , do you mean free WiFi? I don't think anything is free here in Nigeria . We still pay for date from our internet providers here and we don't have free to air internet here...Who told you we have free internet in Nigeria? Lolzz
not free as in price, but free as in not censored.
Yea sure the government here doesn't censor anything or any site...like I said earlier, I think we have bigger problems to deal with here than prying into peoples personal space.
Hello @ashe-oro
I thank you from bringing such topics to the fore. I think this will help offer people the opportunity to speak up against the forces who are bent on implementing policies against freedom of information.
In am from Nigeria and we don't have such censorship. We have access to every informational site, thanks to the just past government of Dr Goodluck Jonathan.
I appreciate you for coming up with this...
@eurogee of @euronation community
Turkey! Same shit, different color.
im from indonesian :)
yup u right in my country a lot website now was blocked ( internet consored )
now I mostly use vpn for browsing
Internet is the part and parcel of our daily life .Without internet can not possible ..
Hi, I hope that people could take their Authority in their own hands, and Government intervention will be minimized. thanks so much bro for this post
ur welcome, thanks for stopping by.
Hey @ashe-oro, great post! I enjoyed your content. Keep up the good work! It's always nice to see good content here on Steemit! :)