When it comes to content-focussed regulations the liberal countries that are home to these tech firms are unlikely to be able to do the same sort of thing.
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Telenor has decided to withdraw from the Myanmar market after being pressured to install surveillance technology on behalf of the military junta, when doing so would break an EU arms embargo. European Union sanctions, for example, "helped" Norwegian telecom company Telenor. In the case of surveillance-related demands, liberal governments have occasionally helped to define these red lines. Google operated a censored search engine in China from 2006 but decided to pull out of the country after the discovery of Operation Aurora, a Chinese state-sponsored effort to hack US private sector companies including Google.Ī third option is to capitulate and tailor their services to suit various countries' regulatory demands.Įither way, companies must think about their red lines and what they can do if they are asked to cross them. And perhaps also the opportunity to make vast sums of money.įor companies already entangled the nuclear option is to withdraw from these markets.
This is by far the cleanest choice, but forgoes the opportunity to provide valuable services to people. One option is to simply not enter such markets in the first place. When it comes to engagement with authoritarian governments, tech companies have a few options. Put differently, the Russian government is happy to let its citizens trade stolen credit cards, but not how-to-vote recommendations. But cyber criminals using it to share stolen data are ignored. In Russia, for example, Telegram gets hit with a stick when it's useful to the opposition party around elections. Other peripheral issues don't get the same state focus.
The Chinese government blocks popular foreign messaging applications to funnel citizens into using surveillance-friendly, locally developed apps, the Russian government prioritises the suppression of opposition political parties (app, content and Telegram channel removal) and the Indian government suppresses political speech.įor these types of governments there is a straight line between what they want and how a tech company can help. There's a single, straightforward motivation behind much of this regulation: governments want to maintain control and stay in power. The weight of the regulators' sticks varies from place to place different governments care about different things. In case we're not being explicit enough, let's just spell it out: It's now impossible for the big tech firms to reconcile the values they project with the realities of state supremacy in illiberal countries. Thus, governments all over the world are passing laws to give themselves more leverage like data localisation requirements and even "hostage-taking laws" that require tech firms to employ local staff. Tech companies are now so important, both economically and in the ways their services inform and shape society, that illiberal governments realise they must shape how these companies operate. Silicon Valley's traditionally strong anti-regulation culture is now crashing head first into a pretty sober reality. In other words, Russia can do this because Russia has hostages. Per Wired, Google's decision to remove the app from its Play Store came after "Russian authorities threatened specific Google employees with serious criminal charges and prosecution". Telegram blocked Navalny's smart voting chat-bot and YouTube took down a video listing the names of all 225 Navalny-endorsed candidates. This week we saw this truth in action when Russian authorities forced tech platforms to take down apps and content promoting jailed Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny's election-related efforts.Īpple and Google removed how-to-vote apps that provided opposition supporters recommendations on who to vote for in different electoral districts in the upcoming Russian parliamentary election.
The cold, hard fact is state power trumps technology companies' content policies. The censorship battle between tech companies and illiberal governments is kicking off in earnest, and so far the tech firms are being completely pantsed. Apple, Google and Telegram Turn to Water on Russia Your weekly dose of Seriously Risky Business news is written by Tom Uren, edited by Patrick Gray and supported by the Cyber Initiative at the Hewlett Foundation, AustCyber and founding corporate sponsors CyberCX and Proofpoint.
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