GuiananZone

Microsoft, Google and Yahoo disclosed this Tuesday a code of conduct set to offer protection to freedom of expression on the Internet and ensure the privacy of users against encroachment by governments in the online environment.

The code, entitled Global Network Initiative, was signed after the companies have suffered criticism for helping governments like China to remove content from the Internet.

Under the agreement, the companies will limit the data you can send to governments on issues that deal with freedom of expression and privacy of users.

"This is an important first step," he says Mike Posner, the non-governmental organization Human Rights First.

"Companies should be stronger in the challenge without interference because of some governments (the Internet)," said Posner.

The document states that privacy is "a human right and a guarantee of human dignity" and says that signatory companies are committed to resist demands for restrictions on freedom of expression and privacy by governments.

The companies also undertake to assess the level of freedom of expression in a country before closing agreements and to ensure that its employees and partners do the same.

"These principles will not be a permanent solution to the problem, but the most important thing for me is that they provide more transparency," said Danny O'Brien, the Electronic Frontier Foudation.

"We join this initiative because we know that a large number of groups working together can achieve more than one company acting alone," said Andrew McLaughlin, director of global public policy at Google.

Accusations

The advent of the agreement happens after years of criticism and accusations that many companies - including Google, Yahoo and Microsoft - agreed to help develop what is known as "The Great Firewall of China", a system of blocking content from Internet the Chinese government.

Google has been accused of meeting requirements of the Chinese government to filter searches on the Internet and eliminate its system of results in searches on words like "democracy" and "Massacre of the Plaza Calestial of Peace", for example.

Already Microsoft has been accused of blocking the blog of a famous researcher of Chinese media that published articles against layoffs in the newspaper Beijing News Daily.

Canadian researchers also say that a Chinese joint venture of Internet service connections for Skype monitored the communications of users.

A Chinese journalist was also sentenced to ten years in prison after the Yahoo China provided their personal information to the government.

Map

This Tuesday, the CEO and co-founder of Yahoo, Jerry Yang, celebrated the signing of the new code of conduct.

"These principles provide a map for companies like Yahoo operate in markets where freedom of expression and privacy are restricted," he said.

"The Yahoo was founded on the belief that promoting access to information can enrich people's lives and the principles agreed today reflect our determination that our actions reflect these values around the world," said Yang.

But while China is often painted as the place where these rights are less respected, the researcher Colin Maclay of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, at Harvard University, says that other countries and governments also commit abuses.

"The number of states seeking censor online content or seeking access to personal information on the Internet is growing," he says.

"The means employed for this - technical, social, legal and political - are increasingly sophisticated and repeatedly put businesses of Internet and telecommunications in delicate situations."

It's about business

The Global Network Initiative was developed by companies on Internet together with groups of human rights, academics and investors.

Adam Kanza, director of the company's investments Domini Social Investments, says that the initiative, as is the "right thing to do" it makes sense in business.

"Freedom of expression is central in the business of these companies. They rely on an internet open, free and secure. If people do not believe in the Internet and do not think it is safe, it is counterproductive to your business. "

But efforts are already being seen by some as inadequate.

"After two years of discussions, they ended with very little," said Morton Sklar, executive director of the NGO World Organization for Human Rights, USA.

"This is little more than a statement of support the general principles, without any mechanism to ensure that concrete measures be taken," he says.

Despite criticism, it is expected that other companies sign the code of conduct and two European companies, France Telecom and Vodafone, have said they were considering adding their names to the agreement.