How reporters are experiencing censorship on social media

[Commentary] Examples of media-related censorship on social media keep piling up.

Social media companies don’t break down their data on withheld content showing whether journalists are specifically targeted by government removal requests. But notifications received by a number of journalists point to wider evidence that journalists are experiencing censorship on social media. When governments issue gag orders, social media companies can find themselves on the defensive: Though beholden to users, they sometimes comply with foreign governments’ requests to remove allegedly illegal content. Freedom of expression activists have criticized Facebook and Twitter for complying in countries where they do not have offices or are not subject to jurisdiction, because when court-ordered reporting bans are enforced by social media companies, through withholding journalists’ or their sources’ accounts or content, an important source of information is endangered in already restricted media environments. Google, Facebook, and Twitter publish biannual reports listing requests they receive from governments to remove content and provide information about users’ accounts, but it’s hard to draw numbers on how many removal requests affect journalists and news outlets since they don’t provide those details in their reports. Google and Twitter do post requests they receive on the clearinghouse Chillingeffects.org, often including documents sent with the requests.

[Catherine Strupp is a freelance journalist based in Berlin]