Internet Censorship in Kuwait

The Emir of Kuwait has been asked to clarify draft law for regulating Internet

Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard wrote requesting clarification of a draft law for regulating the Internet that was announced by the minister for religious endowment and Islamic affairs, Abdallah Al-Muhaylbi, who is also the communications minister. The bill is currently being discussed by the ministries of communications and information:

Reporters Without Borders is closely following the current debate in your emirate about regulating and controlling online content. The minister for religious endowment and Islamic affairs, Abdallah Al-Muhaylbi, last week told the newspaper Al Watan that the government plans to present a draft law for controlling and organising websites and political blogs with the aim of protecting public order, ensuring respect for decency and preserving the values of Kuwaiti society.

Our organisation is worried about the abuses that could be committed in the name of such a law and hopes that certain guarantees will be adopted to protect free expression before it is submitted to parliament.

Reporters Without Borders would therefore like to ask you to provide the clarification that is needed so that this bill can be understood. We appreciate that it is important to regulate the Internet but we also know that this type of law can lead to online censorship. We remind you that in Kuwait, journalists can still be imprisoned for any activity contrary to national interests. The Internet must not be subjected to the same kind of abuses.

After months of planning, Kuwait's Public Prosecutors Office (PPO) is set to finalize a bill that will punish "Internet offenders" in the country.

It seems that constitutional freedoms no longer extend to Kuwait's large (and still growing) population of bloggers. Prosecutor General Hamed Al-Othman said that the bill will criminalize the promotion of immoral conduct, encouraging anti-government sentiments, divulging state secrets, or insulting Islam online. Penalties for breaking the law could involve a 1-year prison sentence (7-years if the insulted party is a minor) and monetary fines.

Speaking of what this new law means for the future of free expression in Kuwait, one blogger told APN this law means two words: shut up. The blogger also noted that most of the Kuwait blogging community is opposing the looming law. This law is a way to control what bloggers publish online; the government wants to know 'who is this blogger?' They want us to shut up so they are free to do anything they want. They can't handle the truth.

The blogger provided a list of tips on their website to help other bloggers stay out of trouble when the new Internet law takes effect. Among the tips is remove the times from comments and leave only dates. As the blogger explains to APN: if I put a comment at 2:03:09 a.m., the government can call all ISP's here in Kuwait and ask for all IP's running at that time. This is more of a safety tip for the commenter than for the blogger. A scheduled publishing system is a way to protect the blogger. For example, if at 8:00 p.m. I am at the cinema and I have a ticket and at 8:10 p.m. Blogger.com publishes my post, nobody can prove that I published the post.

Other tips for bloggers include using symbols or codes to refer to taboo public figures rather than their real names.