Net Results: This year has become the year of internet censorship. Not just by governments in countries where freedom of speech is severely curtailed, but by corporations in the name of potential profits in those same countries.
Censorship on the internet isn't anything new. Attempts to block access to websites, track e-mail, curtail commentary or shut down discussion boards, internet chat and weblogs has a long history in some places in the world.
Freely available software like Phil Zimmermann's encrypted e-mail program Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) or Irish programmer Ian Clarke's peer to peer program FreeNet were developed specifically to allow people in repressive countries to communicate and share information.
In some cases, such software has almost certainly saved lives by keeping political activists anonymous and undoubtedly has kept many political dissidents out of prison.
But until this year, we tended to think it all didn't really have too much to do with us. Those who might be under threat were people who were organised political activists waging campaigns and who knew the risks - weren't they? It was good and heroic that they were fighting the good fight for more freedom within their countries. But nothing, really, to do with you or me.
Well, no. The people involved are just like you and me and very often - indeed most of the time - aren't "activists" but simply people posting opinions or sending personal e-mails of the type many of us have done on internet discussion boards, weblogs or e-mail lists without a second thought.
The event which moved this issue from out of a fog of polite indifference was Google's arrival in China in January. In order to set up a Chinese version of its search engine, Google agreed to Chinese government demands to remove listings of websites on certain "sensitive" topics. The pages would show up on Google's country-based search engines elsewhere (for example, on Google.ie) but not on Google.cn.
As press and the public delved deeper into the situation, it was soon revealed that Yahoo's Chinese operation had handed over data, at the request of the Chinese government, that resulted in the imprisonment of a Chinese journalist (still behind bars). And Microsoft had removed some weblogs from its Chinese MSN site with content the government disliked.
A public outcry ensued, with international press freedom group Reporters Without Borders lambasting Google and its competitors: "US firms are now bending to the same censorship rules as their Chinese competitors, but they continue to justify themselves by saying their presence has a long-term benefit.
"Yet the internet in China is becoming more and more isolated from the outside world and freedom of expression there is shrinking."
I wrote at the time that the heart of the issue is acceptable compromise. What trade-off is a company willing to make to gain access to a market? For Yahoo, handing over data, even if it means sending someone to prison, seems to have been a reasonable swap.
Yahoo said it had to comply with local government laws, but has tended to stoutly defend the privacy of e-mail account users in the rest of the world.
Google's Chinese service launched without the e-mail and free weblogging (online personal journal) services it offers in other countries, presumably to avoid being caught in such an awkward situation.
In the wake of the public furore, Microsoft has since said that while it must comply with the rules of the countries in which it operates, it will no longer take actions such as pulling weblogs without an explanation. The company called for new dialogue on this and other fraught human and civil rights amongst Western companies seeking to do business in repressive parts of the world.
Needless to say, however, none of these companies considered taking a public stance against such censorship which might in any way damage the opportunity to remain and make a buck. And that is one among many reasons why Amnesty International celebrated its 45th birthday this week by launching a website campaign to fight internet censorship. Its goal is to pressure governments to stop restricting access to and the use of the web, and to ask technology companies in particular not to collude with such governments by actively enabling these censorship policies to function.
Yes, I know such companies will say (and have said) they do not actively collude with these governments, but how much more active can you get than handing over data, closing access to websites and obliterating sites and material such governments deem offensive?
The companies have argued that by being in such countries, they help open doors. But the reality is that the same doors have already been opened, usually by Chinese internet companies. Google, for example, is a tiny entrant in the Chinese search engine market, where most Chinese people opt for Chinese sites providing search facilities. What Google, Yahoo or Microsoft add that encourages greater freedoms isn't quite clear.
At the launch this week of Irrepressible.info, a new website to tackle net censorship, Kate Allen, the UK director of Amnesty, said: "I call on governments to stop the unwarranted restriction of freedom of expression and on companies to stop helping them do it."
There is lots of information there on what is happening, a petition to sign and a download that will allow your own website or weblog to show a fragment of discussion on a site that is officially censored by governments in other parts of the world.
Why not make sure that 2006 is indeed the year of internet censorship - the year we recognise it exists and acknowledge we can play a part, no matter how small, in pushing actively for real change.
On such small, incremental actions - at first, the writing of individual protest letters to governments - Amnesty International built one of the most significant and successful movements to support the repressed and many times, brought about their release from prison.
Appropriate then, that a first Irrepressible.info project is to campaign for the release of journalist Shi Tao, whose Yahoo e-mail got him 10 years in a Chinese jail.
