Google Refuses to Censor Police Brutality Videos
December 21st, 2011
Between SOPA and NDAA battle lines are being drawn across the Internet and this week it appears that web giant Google is standing by their unofficial corporate motto, “don’t be evil.” In their recent reflecting the time from January to June, 2011 they revealed their refusal to comply with law enforcement requests to block videos of police brutality on YouTube, which is owned by Google. In the report Google wrote:
“We received a request from a local law enforcement agency to remove YouTube videos of police brutality, which we did not remove… Separately, we received requests from a different local law enforcement agency for removal of videos allegedly defaming law enforcement officials. We did not comply with those requests, which we have categorized in this Report as defamation requests.”
According to the report, of the 757 items the US Government asked them to remove (more than China by the way) Google complied with 63% of those requests stating that they comply when an agency acquires a court order. In the report Google wrote:
“There are many reasons we may not have complied. Some requests… involve allegations of defamation through informal letters from government agencies rather than a court orders(sic). We generally rely on courts to decide if a statement is defamatory according to local law.”
This is yet another strategy in the state’s war on transparency. Whether it’s the immoral persecution of whistleblowers like Bradley Manning, or the dozens, maybe hundreds of activists we’ve seen targeted for trying to film public servants performing public services in public one thing is clear. State officials hate scrutiny. They’d much rather we all just shut the hell up and let them conduct their shenanigans in secret. Unfortunately for them the same technology that allows them to spy on us is allowing us to document them.
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves just yet. Google has struck an important blow for transparency, but their record on protecting privacy leaves some room for improvement. Of the staggering 5,950 requests that various government agencies made for private user data during the 6 month period Google complied 93% of the time. In fact the US Government has made more requests for private user data than any other country in the world. But even though Google complies with these requests, they are at least transparent about receiving them, which is more than we can say for the state.
YouTube videos of police misconduct are the bread and butter of the Liberty Movement, especially for those in the civil disobedience and non cooperation camp. More recently videos of state brutality have been instrumental in galvanizing protesters around the world, from Egypt and Tunisia to our own Occupy Movement. Even Wikileaks first broke into public consciousness with the release of the “collateral murder” video. The message is simple. When people see what the state actually does, they find it intolerable.
Let’s hope this is the first of many steps that Google takes in the right direction. Maybe we could even convince them to change their unofficial corporate motto to “be against evil.”
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