Techdirt. Stories filed under "thailand"

Thailand To Join TPP Negotiations; Access To Medicines Likely To Suffer As A Consequence

Glyn Moody — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 00:00:00 PST

Although things have gotten rather quiet on the TPP front, that doesn't mean that the juggernaut has been halted. On the contrary: after Canada and Mexico signed up to join the negotiations under highly unfavorable terms, it now looks like Thailand is about to do the same, as the Bangkok Post reports:

Thailand's entry into the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will be a highlight of the visit [to Thailand] by the US president amid concern by activists over the consequences of the far-reaching free trade pact.

Those concerns are chiefly about access to medicines at affordable prices. This became an area of contention after previous bilateral negotiations with the US collapsed in the wake of the military coup in Thailand, as infojustice.org explains: In late 2006, after the FTA [Free Trade Agreement] negotiations had fallen apart, the Ministry of Health began granting compulsory licenses for needed medicine. Between November 2006 and January 2007, it granted licenses for patents on two antiretroviral drugs (efavirenz and lopinavir+ritonavir) and clopidogrel, a heart medication sold by Bristol Myers Squibb. The licenses were issued for government use, after years of prior negotiation with the patent holders, and include a 0.5% royalty rate. USTR responded by putting Thailand on the 301 Priority Watch List, citing "further indications of a weakening of respect for patents, as the Thai Government announced decisions to issue compulsory licenses for several patented pharmaceutical products." Thailand has remained in the Special 301 Report ever since, and it was subject to an "out of cycle review."
If Thailand joins the TPP negotiations, it will undoubtedly be forced to rescind those compulsory licenses -- one of the key features of TPP is its strengthening of protection for pharma patents. The inevitable consequence of that will be increased prices in Thailand for key medicines, and more people suffering and dying as a result. It would be interesting to know what pressure has been brought to bear on the Thai government to take what seems such a damaging step for its people, when other nations are moving in precisely the opposite direction.

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Webmaster Convicted For Not Being Fast Enough In Deleting Comments That Insulted Thai King

Mike Masnick — Wed, 30 May 2012 15:04:00 PDT

For a few years now we've covered how the Thai government's ridiculous "lese majeste" laws that forbid insulting the monarchy have been used repeatedly to censor open forums and arrest or intimidate critics. In one case, which we wrote about a few years ago, the webmaster for the popular Thai site Prachatai was arrested for failing to delete comments of users on the site (not written or approved by her) that were deemed offensive to the monarchy fast enough. The post and the comments happened in 2008... but the woman, Chiranuch Premchaiporn (and better known as Jiew), wasn't arrested until 2010, right after she returned from a trip abroad where she was speaking about the importance of internet freedom.

With an awful lot of public attention on the trial -- and just as the World Economic Forum was about to meet in Bangkok -- the court found her guilty -- but also gave her a suspended sentence and a small fine. While that beats the 20 years in prison she could have faced, plenty of people are still pointing to the massive chilling effects such a conviction has on a free and open internet. Certainly, webmasters will have tremendous incentive to limit interaction and comments from the public.

At a time when countries who want to thrive and flourish should be encouraging greater and more widespread use of the internet, convicting a webmaster because the government doesn't like some comments that others left on a website is exactly the wrong approach. It goes against basic principles of free speech and properly applying liability. Yes, lots of countries (including the US at times) have been chipping away at such basic and fundamental ideas online, but it's still disappointing to see countries effectively guaranteeing a lack of openness and innovation within their own borders thanks to moves like this one.

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US Citizen Facing 15 Years In Jail For Linking From His Blog To An Unauthorized Bio Of Thai King

Mike Masnick — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 08:17:58 PDT

I'm curious if Thailand is purposely trying to kill off its rather lucrative tourism business. We've discussed in the past that Thailand has strict laws against "insulting" the king. These lèse majesté laws are used widely in Thailand to stop any sort of political criticism. They've been used to block entire sites including YouTube, and to arrest website owners for the comments on their site.

Lately, Thailand has been trying to use those laws against US citizens. Last month, we wrote about the case of Anthony Chai, a US citizen who had posted some anonymous comments critical of the king. In that case, the Canadian/US firm that hosted the site handed Chai's identity over to the Thai government without question, and Chai was arrested recently while visiting.

In a similar case, US citizen Joe Gordon had posted a link on his blog to an unauthorized bio of the king... and was then arrested when visiting Thailand, the news has come out that after months of denying the charges, Gordon has decided he can't take it any more and has agreed to plead guilty.

"I do not want to fight this case. I plead guilty to all the accusations," he told judges.

At this point, I'm not sure why any US citizen would ever agree to visit Thailand again. If you merely link to an unauthorized bio of the king, you could end up in jail. Furthermore, I'm curious as to what the Thai leadership thinks it's accomplishing with these actions. Honestly, without these cases, I'd never even know about the Thai king at all. It seems like each of these actions only brings greater negative attention on the king than if he'd just ignored such things.

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ISP Sued For Revealing Info On US-Based Critic Of Thai Laws

Mike Masnick — Thu, 1 Sep 2011 07:20:43 PDT

We've been talking a lot about the importance of anonymity online, and are always sad to hear about companies that simply rollover in identifying anonymous users for no good reason. A newly filed lawsuit reveals a particularly ridiculous situation, summarized nicely by Paul Alan Levy:

Anthony Chai, a naturalized US citizen who emigrated from Thailand, runs a computer store in California. Using the store's computers, Chai and his customers posted anonymous comments critical of the king of Thailand on a Thai-language pro-democracy website, Manusaya.com. Thailand forbids criticism of the king – the legal principle of lese majeste – and when the Canadian Internet hosting firm Netfirms (which is incorporated in Delaware and maintains a US office) received a complaint from the Thai government, it not only shut down the web site but provided Chai’s IP address and two e-mail addresses associated with the posts. Thailand has long shown its insistence on applying the principle even to criticism voiced in other countries, when the speakers expose themselves to its authority by, for example, visiting the country.

When Chai was home visiting family in Thailand, he was detained at the airport and subjected to extensive questioning and to threats of violence against his family both in the United States and in Thailand. He was also repeatedly questioned in the United States, with prosecutors using the threat of prosecution, and dangling and threatened with prosecution. The prosecutor also demanded expensive gifts. Chai has been officially charged in the Thai courts with l�se majest�, and consequently he can no longer return to his native land to visit his family. Ironically, most of Chai's posts were directed at the injustice of the lese majeste laws, rather than at the Thai king himself.

We've pointed out how Thailand has been known to overreact to criticism of its king before, and this is even more crazy, seeing as Chai was mainly criticizing the laws that make criticizing the king illegal. But, the other key issue here is the fact that Netfirms simply handed over Chai's info, without consideration of whether or not that was appropriate or if it violated Chai's rights. It also handed over the info without "requesting that the officials obtain the proper court order, supboena, or warrant as required by the Treaty with Thailand on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters." Chai is now suing Netfirms, claiming negligence and violation of California laws, including its constitutional right to privacy. Should be an interesting case to watch.

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Oh Look, Sony Hacked Again, Site Used For Phishing

Mike Masnick — Mon, 23 May 2011 04:43:31 PDT

Late on Friday, the news came out that Sony had been hacked yet again, and this time the hacked site was being used for phishing. This was totally unrelated to the PlayStation Network hacks, but involved a website for Sony Thailand. Still, given all the trouble Sony has had lately keeping its systems secure, this seems to just add another layer to the stack of questions about Sony's technical competence.

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Thai Government Official Admits That Internet Blacklists Don't Work

Mike Masnick — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 02:42:50 PST

As the US prepares to launch its own internet blacklist, it should be noted that over in Thailand, a senior government minister, Thongchai Sangsiri, overseeing internet and computer forensic related issues is saying that Thailand's internet blacklist has been a major failure and should be scrapped.

"The blacklists grow with many, many websites to become a burden on ISPs. Blacklisting doesn't work."

He later notes that putting up such a blacklist is a political move: it looks good because citizens think their government is doing something. But the reality is that it just doesn't work and just creates more burdens.

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Thai Gov't Arrests News Site Owner, Because It Doesn't Like Some Comments By Users

Mike Masnick — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 19:04:43 PDT

We've discussed a few times in the past about how the Thai government uses rules that say it's illegal to insult the Thai king in order to censor websites that it doesn't like. Now it seems to be taking this even further. The EFF has the details of how the webmaster for a political news site in Thailand has been arrested over comments on the site. As the EFF summarizes:

Jiew's crime? In 2008, Prachatai published an interview with Chotisak Onsoong, a Thai man known for refusing to stand at attention during the Thai Royal Anthem -- a dangerous political act in Thailand, though not technically a crime. The interview received huge attention, drawing over 200 comments from Thai citizens. On April 28, 2008, complaints were filed against Prachatai alleging that several comments on that interview were a defamation to the Monarchy. An arrest warrant for Jiew was issued on Septemeber 8, 2009, but no summons was received by Jiew until her arrest this past Friday.

The EFF also notes that this appears to be purely political and about intimidation, as the timing of the arrest (despite the fact that the warrant was issued over a year ago) didn't happen until Jiew was returning to Thailand from a trip abroad where she gave two separate talks about the importance of an open and free internet.

Of course, in the long run, as with the attempts to shut down sites under this same law, all this seems to really be doing is calling that much more attention to how the Thai government uses the rules in questionable ways.

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Thailand Continues To Try To Mimic China With Internet Censorship

Mike Masnick — Thu, 4 Sep 2008 04:27:49 PDT

In early 2007, some Thai government officials totally overreacted to a silly video making fun of Thailand's king, and banned all of YouTube. Of course, the inevitable result wasn't that the video went away, but that it got a lot more attention both inside and outside of Thailand thanks to the futile attempt to ban it. Since then, it's clear that Thai officials have not learned their lesson. Over and over again we've seen reports of Thailand banning certain websites -- often political discussion sites -- because the government officials don't like what's being said. The government even passed a law making it illegal to try to circumvent these blocks to get at any banned website.

And, once again, all this is doing is drawing more interest in the blocked sites. The latest report is that the gov't has demanded that ISPs block hundreds of sites that it doesn't like for whatever reason. Perhaps in blocking so many sites at once, it's hoping that the details of why get lost in the mix, but it hardly seems likely to be all that effective in the long run. While some may compare the situation to China and its Great Firewall, considering the massive bureaucracy that involves tens of thousands of people to manage the Great Firewall, it may be difficult for Thailand to effectively replicate it.

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Thailand Overreacts; Bans Grand Theft Auto Due To Stupid Kid

Mike Masnick — Mon, 4 Aug 2008 13:44:08 PDT

What is it with people wanting to blame technology for crimes rather than the idiots who perpetrate the crimes? The latest is that Thailand has banned the sale of Grand Theft Auto IV after an idiot kid killed a cab driver when he tried to carjack the taxicab. The kid claimed that he was copying a scene from the game, and wanted to see if it was as easy to do as in the game. In other words: "Not my fault! The game made me do it!" And, of course, the government believed this killer, rather than recognizing that it wasn't the game, but this kid's own demented brain that was responsible. If it wasn't GTA IV, it would have been something else. Banning GTA IV isn't going to stop such violence, but it will give anyone caught for murder a nice excuse about why it's not their fault.

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Buddhist Monks Warned To Stop Using Social Networks To Flirt With Girls

Mike Masnick — Wed, 5 Mar 2008 09:14:00 PST

You certainly see some bizarre stories about older cultures adapting to newer technologies, but this might be one of the most bizarre. Thai officials are apparently warning Buddhist monks to behave themselves on social networking sites and to stop using them to flirt with women. If there ever were a quote I didn't expect I'd hear, it would probably be this one, from Ladda Thangsupachai, head of Thailand's Cultural Surveillance Centre.

"Instead of using the Net to flirt with young girls, monks should find ways to preach Dharma and lead them in the right direction."

Maybe they just haven't found the right Facebook apps yet.

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Thailand Sliding Down The Slippery Slope Of Net Censorship

Dennis Yang — Tue, 8 Jan 2008 04:14:00 PST

The Thai sure do love their king; anyone who has visited on a Monday surely has noticed the sea of yellow shirts in celebration of the King's birthday, which falls on a Monday. So great is their love for him, that it is a crime to say anything bad about him or the government. So, when a message board on sameskybooks.org (not sameskybooks.com, as incorrectly reported by the AP) criticized the monarchy, Thai officials shut down the political website, first threatening to shut down its ISP, Netservice. Although the site in question was indeed a radical political website, the content for which the site was shut down came from a public message board. Should a site be held accountable for posts that they did not create? Well, this is not the first time the Thai government has banned a site in such a way -- back in April, Thailand banned all of YouTube for a supposedly offensive video. What's next? The Bangkok Post has written up the story, should it be banned as well?

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YouTube Says It's Sorry, Promises Thailand It Won't Do It Again, Gets Unblocked

Carlo Longino — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 11:53:11 PDT

Back in April, the Thai government gained itself some publicity by blocking YouTube, after it discovered a video on the site making fun of the country's king. Google apparently decided that censoring videos deemed offensive by the Thais was acceptable on its sliding scale of evil, and now that the "program" to block the videos is apparently complete, Thais can once again access YouTube. No word, though, on whether the Thai government still plans to sue YouTube for running the video. Perhaps since the YouTube blocking technology works to the government's satisfaction, Google would be willing to cooperate with the Thais to help them with their other attempts to censor the internet. After all, if blocking some YouTube videos at the government's request doesn't trip the evil scale, it's hard to see why any other type of censorship would.

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