What You Say – Or Blog About – Can Be Used Against You
Since 9/11 the United States has implemented stricter controls at its borders in order to prevent terrorists from entering the country. Border agents now use a vastly enhanced database – made up of data shared between its security agencies – to weed out suspects. It also appears that US immigration inspectors are increasingly turning to the Internet – and Google in particular – to find out more about its visitors, sometimes with unpleasant consequences.
Take the case of Canadian psychotherapist Andrew Feldmar, who admitted to LSD use way back in his graduate school days in the 1960’s in an academic journal, an electronic version of which was published on the Internet. An inquisitive Customs agent Googled Mr. Feldmar’s name when he recently attempted to enter the US, and what the search results revealed turned what should have been an uneventful trip into a nightmare:
“He was told to sit down on a folding chair and for hours he wondered where this was going. He checked his watch and thought hopelessly of his friend who was about to land at the Seattle airport. Three hours later, the official motioned him into a small, barren room with an American flag. He was sitting on one side and Feldmar was on the other. The official said that under the Homeland Security Act, Feldmar was being denied entry due to “narcotics” use. LSD is not a narcotic substance, Feldmar tried to explain, but an entheogen. The guard wasn’t interested in technicalities. He asked for a statement from Feldmar admitting to having used LSD and he fingerprinted Feldmar for an FBI file.
“Then Feldmar disbelievingly listened as he learned that he was being barred from ever entering the United States again. The officer told him he could apply to the Department of Homeland Security for a waiver, if he wished, and gave him a package, with the forms.”
Mr. Feldmar isn’t a blogger but his remarks found its way into the Internet anyway. He isn’t exactly a blogger who ran afoul of the law because of what he published but comes awfully close, and should remind us who have chosen to go public with our real-life identities to be a little more careful with what we post online.
What of bloggers who have been imprisoned for expressing themselves? Sadly, there are too many of them in jail:
“While most bloggers have nothing to fear from their postings, for a small but increasing number of cyber dissidents blogging has become a matter of life and death. Take Abdel Karim Suleiman, the 22-year-old Egyptian blogger who recently received a four-year jail sentence for charges that include “spreading information disruptive of public order and damaging to the country’s reputation”.
“Then there is Tunisian lawyer and human rights defender Mohammed Abbou, now serving a three-and-a-half year prison sentence for publishing articles critical of his homeland’s authorities on the internet. Or Iranian blogger Mojtaba Saminejad, who was tortured during his 88 days in solitary confinement.
“According to free-speech campaigners Reporters Without Borders, 30 bloggers and cyber-dissidents were detained in 2006, with a total of 68 now in jail. The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said that internet writers and editors are the fastest-growing segment of imprisoned journalists, with 49 behind bars as of December last year.”
