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The most pervasive censorship is who and what social media companies decide to block or suppress. Even in places like China. It's deliberately harder to measure, but any censorship measurement that omits it is like measuring war casualties, but ignoring those on the front lines.
Not to minimize the impact of social media censorship, but one should really live in a country like Iran to grasp what pervasive censorship is. Most people born and raised in the relative freedoms provided in modern democratic systems have no clue what it feels like when you have such dictatorships. I say this because, looking at the current trends, we _could be_ heading in that direction, and the comparison is apt.
I'm curious what trends you see towards censorship?
Elon presumably being an exemplar for current trends: Twitter is unarguably far less censored than it was before (though censorship is still present). And Meta took note and also turned down its censorship significantly in response.
The Epstein files, while far less than hoped for by many, are another example of a trend towards sharing far more sensitive info than has been typical by past administrations.
There are many good examples you could point to of increased authoritarianism, but censorship in particular seems to be on the backswing, if anything.
Edit: oof, it's extremely concerning that the comment below was flagged
It’s too soon for such a conclusion IMO. The pervasive Iran-like censorship I was talking about will rear its ugly head when those authoritarian regimes are established. It’s a tool and I can assure you it will be used extensively. This is nothing new really.
P.S. the Epstein files were just a cruel joke! I wouldn’t list it there.
It doesn't add up for me. If the goal is simply authoritarian control, why would they employ less censorship than their predecessors?
Surely they could get away with at the very least the same amount?
There’s nothing simple about authoritarian control.
Who says we have less censorship? Sure people can tweet all kind of stuff without getting banned. Fine, but at the same time US president is removing news networks he doesn’t like from press briefings. That’s just one example. To say the censorship is in decline is baffling.
Multiple jurisdictions have tried to play the stupid games of "we'll make a dumb fuck law that creates problems for you, the website operator, and if you don't conform, we'll sinkhole you at ISP level". Platforms like Xitter and Telegram being the common early targets.
The "age verification" push is a big move in that direction in Western countries. "Think of the children" is an evergreen excuse for authoritarian measures.
A publisher making editorial decisions is not censorship. You have no right to demand Twitter publish your speech. If you don't like their editorial policies, you are free to go elsewhere. You are not prevented from speaking or even prevented from reaching an audience. None of these platforms is a monopoly.
For my money, I would prefer to hang out somewhere where people don't openly celebrate the murder of my family. Would you deny me that right? If so, you are not on the side of freedom. I don't object to the existence of forums like /pol/ or today's Twitter; if you object to the existence of moderated forums like Twitter in its prime then you are the one restricting speech.
Today, we see flagrant examples of the literal government literally prohibiting people from speaking their minds. Literal masked thugs with literal guns are literally grabbing people off the streets. This is censorship like the Soviets did it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu3q1eYyR1A
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/19/us/politics/trump-cnn-msn...
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fcc-disney-abc-early-license-re...
https://www.aclum.org/cases/ozturk-v-trump/
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2026/07/31/p...
https://www.propublica.org/article/caught-in-crackdown-ice-c...
Twitter has certainly relaxed its policies on racism and violence in recent years, and perhaps you think that's a good thing. But point out that they're paying Nazis to post about their hatred of Jews (an undisputed fact even if you object to the framing) and they'll file SLAPP suits to try to bankrupt you. They very much go in for censorship (the real kind, backed up by guys with guns) when it benefits them.
https://www.fire.org/news/fire-statement-x-corps-lawsuit-and...
When a social media deletes users posts because they cross a political line, it may not be government censorship, but it's very obviously still censorship.
It's very hard to take opinions like yours seriously because I know exactly how you'd react if all your HN posts were deleted because you're calling people "Nazis"
I exclusively use websites that "censor" their users. Millions upon millions of people are with me on this. Would you deny us our right to organize as we please?
If you deny that there are literal and unabashed Nazis on Twitter these days, you are wrong. I am not using the term as a pejorative; I am using it as a straightforward descriptor for people who post pictures of swastikas and SS officers, start their posts with "Hitler was right", have "1488" in their bios, and write my name (((like this))) every damn time. These sorts of people would not be offended by being called Nazis and are not shy about their desire to see me gassed to death. Twitter paid them to say these things and then tried to censor people who criticized them for it, and that's a fact.
Hell, I didn't even call this guy a Nazi:
https://tinyurl.com/5n94mk74
Are you really going to conflate publishing with operating a social media platform? Regardless, if those editorial decisions are meant to suppress a viewpoint, it is censorship - government censorship is only one kind.
Nobody argued that what social media do is illegal, only that it counts as censorship.
censorship of websites is done to move more of population onto social platforms you control
one isn't ignoring the other
Hmm.
I'd wager the vast majority of internet censorship is within platform, like that done by Reddit mods.
The most egregious example I've seen in my lifetime was when old Twitter decided to censor a NYPost article, down to blocking sharing in DMs.
It seems that type of example is entirely missed here. Is there any attempt to capture that signal?
As a thought exercise, could it be captured?
Depends on the platform. On Reddit, definitely yes, as almost all censorship is "deletion style" where the target post or comment is initially visible until the mods suppress it.
But your point is well taken, it's definitely more challenging and expensive than what's being done here.
It would be one heck of a challenge, but, almost by definition "impossible" - as a naive guess, perhaps (for those platforms that have opened code) characterize some statistical signatures that "arbitrary data" ran through it (simulating user activity) would show ...
... and then check for those (or, counterexamples) in the wild.-
That used to be the case on Reddit, not any more as about half of all accounts start off shadowbanned and mods approve their posts.
Join the referral program for a low cost online pharmacy. Post a link on each platform informing the users about the availability of male health products. Measure if it gets removed.
If you count platform moderation as 'censorship' then there's practically no uncensored public spaces on the internet.
Literally even 4chan has moderation.
Nobody, not even 4chan users, want an actually unmoderated space.
You still want to know the extent of that 'moderation' that is totally not censorship. E.g. Facebook and Instagram ban white nationalism, and Youtube has banned American Renaissance, meaning we can infer Google bans white nationalism too, as American Renaissance is guilty of nothing else.
You may agree or disagree with the ban, but surely you agree that we should be aware of such Overton window enforcement?
4chan users might want that, but even for the types of people willing to operate a site like that they don't want to be liable for the amount of CSAM, piracy, and other legally objectionable material that would end up on a fully unmoderated site.
Deciding what is spam and blocking it is moderation or "censorship".
If 4chan didnt have spam filters, the users would be begging for it almost immediately because the website would become unusable.
We might be talking past each other a bit. I agree that without any sort of spam filter a comment site would become unusable.
What I was trying to point out is that there are a lot of users of these 'edgy' sites that would like to post content that the site owners don't want them posting. So the site owner censors and removes CSAM and piracy so that the site isn't immediately in a legal black hole. The site owners remove content that at least some of the users would want be a use they find it morally or legally objectionable. Spam is kinda orthogonal to that point, since neither the site owner or the users want to see it.
What you said about spam is exactly what I'm trying to point out.
There are forms of moderation that we often dont even think of as moderation or 'censorship' because its removing content that "nobody" wants to see. One may argue that the spammers are users of the site who are being censored.
Also, this is a side note, but I'd assume that the overwhelming majority of even 4chan users are in favour of CSAM being banned from the site, even if there are some users who want to see it (i could be wrong about that, it's not like i even have anecdotes to back that up)
CSAM and piracy aren't the worst of examples on a site like 4chan. People... like clinically insane people just keeps scriptbombing someone's private addresses and bomb threats and other schizophrenic copypastas(not regular ones like Blackbird speed checks or "Glasses are versatile", but more like cognitohazards) as well as there will be viagra/cialis/poker/prostitution/roblox spams. I think those in that order should be the primary concern for keeping BBS running because those chase normal people away.
For the two categories mentioned above that are plainly illegal, I think, ironically, you can probably just keep AI classifiers running and wait for calls from NCMEC or DMCA emails, exploiting safe harbor clauses and/or by pointing at reasonable measures you've taken. If you have a large post volumes and short public log retention(private logs will probably have to be kept), that would help keeping the pressure low for those.
Some of the moderation is just banning people with differing opinions.
Some of the opinions that differ are really bad ones.
Yes, but some of them aren't. There are instances of people being banned because they participated in another sub. Instances of people being banned for criticizing Israel. It wouldn't be so much of an issue if it was like back in the day where there were a thousand independent boards. But Reddit killed that.
I had an account banned simply for pointing out that there was a spare seat in that orbiting sports car, and implying that Musk would be a good choice of passenger.
It made me wonder how unlikely or impossible an event has to be before it would no longer be considered a real threat by whoever or whatever flags posts like that. Firing billionaires into the Sun? Hmm, probably too close to home. Sending them light years away to fire them into a black hole?
Would you click a button to ban everyone who participated in /WeLoveHitler or would you individually evaluate each one?
I wouldn't even look at what other communities someone is participating in
My comment above does not rely on the premise that all moderation is censorship. Only that some Reddit mods engage in censorship.
Regardless there's value to know exactly what topics are off limits and for which platforms. Censorship needs to be measured and quantified (probably with vectors).
Moderation as in "You can't call the other posted 'fuckface'" and moderation as in "I will delete every mention of this news story because it's negative to the agenda I want to push" are not, at all, the same thing.
In fact, I wouldn't call the latter "moderation" at all, rather it's mods abusing their power to push political propaganda, but they do it through moderation in terms of action.
What if the news story is just calling someone fuckface? A lot of them are like that in this age of slop news.
I want an unmoderated space. Or rather, I want the tools of moderation to be in the hands of the users instead of a central authority.
Giving an anonymous rando the power to censor my conversation is abhorrent. And it's absurd that most people are ok with that.
i can name at least (1) thing that wants "unmoderated space": LLMs.
Yes? Moderation is a form of censorship with a different connotation (the one you agree with vs the other you don't). I don't see how it's controversial
Which article, about what subject?
Are there NYPost articles you feel people should be prevented from DMing? Or posting, for that matter?
They censored the Hunter Biden laptop story weeks before the election.
Not just reddit mods. Google 2013 Eglin Air Force Base incident reddit.
This is very much in line with the likes of pokemon go, wiki landmark projects and what have you (those are nice things to have for autonomous drones/missiles to navigate only with vision when gps/cellular/starlink is actively blocked).
—
Russia banned stuff like speedtest because things like that may help “map” the network, aid NSA to model malware propagation, etc.
Not that this should matter when you have cisco, dell, nokia hardware, but it won’t hurt either.
—
I mean come on, some nuts even willingly install stuff like this: https://atlas.ripe.net/
Are you arguing for security by obscurity?
That's the point of open data. Anyone can use it, and that includes the NSA or any other state actor you don't like, but it also includes anyone else. I don't see what's wrong with running things like RIPE Atlas if the data is actually open and not just given to the NSA only for their purposes.
I really wonder if anyone installs it on their machine. May be I am one off but I am Hearing about this for first time, don't recognize any of their partners.
Many of the partners are country focused but the Tor Project, Citizen Lab, and Internet Society are well known to me.
I would love to contribute, but i do not think it is a good idea to install and run this in China…enough said. Also i already know the outcome: network is fast, everything is blocked
Do they arrest you just for trying to load a blocked site?
They do not. But it is pretty pointless I would guess: probably most of the domains this tries to visit will be blocked.
Documenting that fact is the point.
In China's case, it is a very well known and documented fact that heavy censorship is present. Of course if one thinks additional knowledge on that is useful enough to solicit wide user participation, that is certainly one way of thinking.
Censor lists can be slightly different on different networks. Also the exact addresses that are censored changes over time. The probe collects this data. "Everyone knows it's censored" is not data. There is a good chance that someone else on your network ran the probe recently though, if that's what you mean by your excuse.
Would be cool if it also measured the latency and throughput across many different protocols to detect deviations from net neutrality.
Related: you can "traceroute" a specific port, TCP or UDP. Different routes for different ports is a sure sign of tampering. Check the man page for syntax.
For everyone in this thread saying "but the platforms!", I don't disagree with you. Extensive censorship exists. But I don't believe that's the intended purpose of this tool and the metrics it collects. It doesn't measure censorship at what we would call layers 4-7 in the OSI model. It's concerned with IP reachability and layer 3. It collects valid data for that purpose.
Do they distinguish between "censored in transit" and "blocked by destination"?
In the last years many sites started to drop/block connections from the countries like China and Russia. It is sad to see how Internet is becoming more and more fragmented.
The latter one isn't censorship, it's geofencing. Which is incredibly unfortunate (and always has been), but it's not censorship.
Which is a type of censorship.
Many websites block UK IPs rather than comply with some recent KYC laws.
There's a pretty bad bias problem here because the probe app scans domains that are frequently blocked in dictatorships, but doesn't scan domains that are frequently blocked in "democracies", like Anna's Archive. Then it ends up looking like the dictatorship countries have all the censorship.
I would only use the term "censorship" to refer to the prevention of speech based on its content. Content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions aren't censorship according to the way I use the word, and neither is copyright protection.
Note that censorship isn't necessarily bad and restrictions on speech that aren't censorship aren't necessarily acceptable. The prohibition on child pornography is censorship but I support it, while I am opposed to IP law in its entirety.
Anna's Archive is prevented by some countries from visiting because of its (presumably illegal) content. All restrictions are based on its content.
Is that in fact the reason? I'm not familiar with what's happening outside the USA.
See "Spotify lawsuit" in the wikipedia article. Also:
"In January 2024, Italy's ... ordered major internet service providers (ISPs) in the country to block Anna's Archive due to a copyright complaint..."
"In March 2024, ... ordered major ISPs in the Netherlands to block Anna's Archive and LibGen due to a request by advocacy group BREIN (which represents the interests of the Dutch entertainment industry)."
"In December 2024, the UK Publishers Association won an order from the High Court of Justice requiring major ISPs to block Anna's Archive... under section 97A of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act."
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna%27s_Archive
I don't think they are disputing it was blocked more the reason was copyright not other reasons.
Copyright is a content-based reason.
My point is - copyright is also a "content related" reason: some site is banned because the content of the site is infringing the copyright of someone else.
In the end, all censorship is content related. One could definitely argue along the spectrum of "all" to "none" censorship is appropriate, but I would guess most people actually hold the belief that "some" censorship is okay, while disagreeing on "which" censorship is okay.
If this is the case, then the bias problem is indeed relevant.
Plus, this sentence in the original post I replied to really struck me as absurd: "Content-neutral time, place, and manner restrictions aren't censorship".
Let's imagine a country bans the distribution of all writings by authors in another country/region disregard of the content. It would not be censorship according to the original post.
The fact that a ban encompasses a wide variety of content could mean simply that it is difficult/undesirable to limit the scope of the ban, but the censorship always originates from the content.
Interesting. When will OpenAI and friends be blocked on the same grounds?
Nobody is blocking it because the internet is only allowed on weekdays or because all pages must have a blue background...
It all depends on what you're censoring.
Is it a bad sign if CSAM, Personal (medical, financial, etc) Records, Snuff, and Malware/Ransomeware are censored? What about manufacture of WMDs, terrorism, hate speech? Free software, and copyrighted music? Historical records of genocide?
As an aside… the if there was a real system out there that was trustworthy, it would have all of this and it would be the evidence you actually need to trust it.
If someone had a secure system for some of the worst stuff out there and it lasted more than a minute, pay attention because they might have actually solved some real problems.
Here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I2p
Is there any authority in any country in the world that can be trusted to censor just what it's supposed to censor?
Doubt it. Besides malice there's also incompetence.
See the article that's also on the front page right now about Spain blocking Cloudflare (i.e. half the internet) during football matches.
You'd still want that censorship to be documented.
Scare quoting democracies is probably telling, but OONI absolutely does test content blocked in Western countries. https://explorer.ooni.org/domain/annas-archive.org
scare quoting """""""""democracies""""""""" is perfectly acceptable when it couldn't be more obvious that those so-called democracies do anything but represent the will of their peoples. do you know anyone who'd voted for having to scan their face to access verboten webseites? to have encryption backdoors in their messengers? to have state-mandated spyware preinstalled on their phones?
They don’t represent the people’s will, but unfortunately many people believe in censorship, so even if they were true direct democracies we may still see some.
I think we would see more.
Yes, I do know people who voted for the party that pushes things like this in my country.
In the UK, both of the main parties push internet censorship. As do the third party and the SNP.
Plenty of people are happy to surrender their freedom for a feeling of security.
...you'd be surprised, plenty of regular people actually want these things to happen. State is God for reliably the majority of the population of the world (seeing as the majority resides in China and South Asia).
People don’t vote for it for themselves, they vote for it for others and are surprised when it applies to them just the same.
I know a few. They're called "normal people who don't suffer from crippling tech libertarianism" and there's more of them than of you.
They voted for it or you assume they don't mind it existing?
They accept it as a tradeoff. They vote for things like "less crime" or "our children don't access things that are bad for them".
you must have plenty of unambiguous evidence then, given how numerous such goodthinking individuals apparently are.
where do these paragons of civil obedience congregate? how do they express their wishes for less freedom and more surveillance?
They're all around you irl. Touch grass and find out.
And to your sarcastic remarks about those people being dumb, believe it or not not everyone is willing to forgo every possible evil in the name of personal privacy in remote communication. Such privacy was never a thing until very recently anyway.
(In fact as far as most people are concerned it isn't a thing today either, you'd be surprised how many people assume that their messages and calls are spied on anyway)
and so you've spent 20 minutes editing this comment to optimize the amount of snark instead of simply showing me one proof of that silent majority's existence :)
It's not in the scan list by default. You can type in any domain and scan it but those are sporadic.
Edit: it must have been added recently since there's proper data now. But most of the CUII list is still not.
Internet blocking is a last resort for regimes that can't do anything against the source of the information or intermediaries, but it's a red herring in regimes that can. Anna's Archive has a political position and is one of the very few voices that survived the immense pressure. How many didn't? How many attempts were not performed at all because of it? This suppression is really hard to measure, OONI can't do anything here, it measures blocking. It's very simple to understand.
It measures blocking in dictatorships, as I just said.
"democracies" have a separate problem, even if we had true direct democracy (and not representative democracy)- people often conflate what is popular with what is true.
You can see this directly in online forums (including this one), unpopular truths are routinely flagged to the point where it doesn't matter that discussion could have happened, it effectively can't- and not because the points don't make sense or can't be reasoned with... but because it doesn't feel good that it's true.
So, unfortunately, I think censorship is inevitable.. I guess it's better to have censorship from a small group of people for a small group of people instead of having censorship from a small group of people to a nation-wide group of people though.
"Dictatorship" is the standard forum design. Reddit, HN, X, Lemmy... All of them. And censorship is common. We literally prefer it that way. I think it's to create a solid blame trail. I think that's a necessary thing.
I think what 'we' prefer is the bad team's posts being censored, but none of our team's stuff getting censored.
But what we prefer and what's good for us are two drastically different things.
that part, right there. "what we prefer, and what's good for us are two drastically different things" is why this stuff will keep happening in places like my country. We're raised thinking any discomfort at all must mean something is wrong, which is not the case. if you're experiencing discomfort it means you're literally being pushed to grow past your current plateaus, both physically, and mentally. I don't know of any slogans like "a bag of potato chips a day keeps the doctor away" or "avoid pain? you gain". Chances are whatever the most uncomfortable way something could unfold for you, within reason, is probably the best thing for you to experience.
I actually do the opposite now. The second something aligns with my own ideals perfectly, I inherently distrust it. Because that shouldn't happen. We all think a lot alike, but also very differently. If any political party, commercial, or anything meant to be absorbed by the masses seems like it's perfectly aligned with you? It most likely is bad for you, in my experience.
Ripe atlas have thousand of endpoint that can ping/fetch.
Pretty strong censorship. That's why I can't even open this link in my country.
Related:
Quack: Scalable Remote Measurement of Application-Layer Censorship:
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurit...
Global Measurement of DNS Manipulation:
https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/usenixsecurit...
Reachability index of Internet blockade circumvention tools:
https://explorer.ooni.org/circumvention
Psiphon:
https://forge.psiphon.ca/en/what-is-psiphon