AP to expand news bureau in North Korea

The Associated Press, reporting on itself, reports:

The Associated Press and the North Korean state news agency have signed a series of agreements, including one for the opening of a comprehensive AP news bureau in Pyongyang, the organizations announced Wednesday.

The AP story does not address possible censorship or explain any restrictions that will be placed on AP's North Korea bureau.

Censoring the news

Tracy Wilkinson, Mexico bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times, writes about the trend of "narco-censorship" among Mexico's reporters:

It's when reporters and editors, out of fear or caution, are forced to write what the traffickers want them to write, or to simply refrain from publishing the whole truth in a country where members of the press have been intimidated, kidnapped and killed.

Closer to home, the teachers' union in Los Angeles plans to boycott the Los Angeles Times over a story that linked teacher performance to student test scores:

"You're leading people in a dangerous direction, making it seem like you can judge the quality of a teacher by … a test," said A.J. Duffy, president of United Teachers Los Angeles, which has more than 40,000 members.

If it washes up on a beach and no one's there to see it...

Newsweek reports on complaints from news photographers that British Petroleum, with the aid of local and federal officials, is blocking access to areas hardest hit by the Gulf oil spill.

From the story:

Last week, a CBS TV crew was threatened with arrest when attempting to film an oil-covered beach. On Monday, Mother Jones published this firsthand account of one reporter’s repeated attempts to gain access to clean-up operations on oil-soaked beaches, and the telling response of local law enforcement. The latest instance of denied press access comes from Belle Chasse, La.-based Southern Seaplane Inc., which was scheduled to take a New Orleans Times-Picayune photographer for a flyover on Tuesday afternoon, and says it was denied permission once BP officials learned that a member of the press would be on board.

This morning, scientists said the Deepwater Horizon leak had probably surpassed the Exxon Valdez as the worst oil spill in U.S. history.

Tying the Intertubes

The Thai government has turned to online censorship in its effort to quell an anti-government uprising. Todd Ruiz at Reporter in Exile has the scoop - here's an excerpt:

Blocking URLs to prevent the flow of information is like trying to dam a river with your hands. You just get wet and look stupid. Especially since any of the thousands of proxy servers so easily circumvents your finest efforts.

That hasn't stopped the censorship-loving Thai government, which steers all TCP/UDP port 80 traffic through its Ministry of Information and Communication Technology, from dropping the ban hammer on thousands of websites, YouTube videos and news sites since the red crisis began mid-March.

All in the name of protecting those delicate, vulnerable Thai minds from the weighty burden of critical thought.

The complete post is here.

Surprise! China used Google to spy on activists

Google has threatened to pull the plug on its operations in China after discovering that the emails of human rights activists had been hacked.

From AP:

The company disclosed in a blog post that it had detected a "highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China." Further investigation revealed that "a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists," Google's post said.

Google did not specifically accuse the Chinese government. But the company added that it is "no longer willing to continue censoring our results" on its Chinese search engine, as the government requires. Google says the decision could force it to shut down its Chinese site and its offices in the country.

Pre-photoshop prudes

There was a time when newspapers wanted to cover up celebrity skin! Sociological Images has a few old photos from the Los Angeles Times that show what they did when faced with a salacious shoulder.

Chinese computers unshackled

The Chinese government has delayed indefinitely a requirement that all personal computers sold in the country include special software designed to block pornography and anything else officials deemed unsavory.

From the New York Times:

The filtering software has been the object of furious online debate since the requirement to install it was disclosed. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, which licensed the technology from two Chinese developers, says the software automatically blocks Web surfers from seeing “unhealthy Internet content.” Updated lists of banned content are automatically downloaded onto users’ computers from the developers’ servers.

But the software’s current list of banned words, posted online by Chinese hackers, is laced with political topics. Businesses have complained that the software is so poorly designed that it opens computers not just to government snooping, but also to hacker attacks by vandals and criminals.

U.S. official protested the requirement as a violation of free-trade agreements and Chinese retailers had backlogs of pristine PCs.