A court in Egypt has ordered that YouTube be blocked for a month for its refusal to take down the controversial 'Innocence of Muslims' video that triggered violent anti-American protests last September.
Judge Hassouna Tawfiq ordered YouTube blocked for carrying the film, which he described as “offensive to Islam and the Prophet (Muhammad).”
The film, which was produced by an Egyptian-born Coptic Christian who’s now a US citizen, sparked deadly protests that killed more than 50 people in more than 20 countries last year.
A court in Egypt has ordered that YouTube be blocked for a month for its refusal to take down the controversial 'Innocence of Muslims' video that triggered violent anti-American protests last September. Judge Hassouna Tawfiq ordered YouTube blocked for carrying the film, which he described as “offensive to Islam and the Prophet (Muhammad).”
The film, which was produced by an Egyptian-born Coptic Christian who’s now a US citizen, sparked deadly protests that killed more than 50 people in more than 20 countries last year. The court ruled the authorities must take measures to block access to the site for a month, after a complaint by an Egyptian who accused YouTube of being a “threat to social peace” by putting the US-made film on line.
Similar orders to censor pornographic websites deemed offensive have not been enforced in Egypt because of high costs associated with technical applications, although blocking YouTube may be easier to enforce. The Egyptian administrative court's verdict comes in response to a suit filed in September by Mohamed Hamed Salem, an Egyptian lawyer who demanded that YouTube be blocked until its administrators removed all anti-Islamic content. Human rights lawyer Gamal Eid said the decision to ban YouTube stems in large part from a lack of knowledge among judges about how the Internet works. YouTube’s parent company, Google, declined to remove the video from the website last year, but restricted access to it in certain countries, including Egypt, Libya and Indonesia, because it says the video broke laws in those countries. At the height of the protests, YouTube was ordered blocked in several countries, including Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia.
Judge Hassouna Tawfiq ordered YouTube blocked for carrying the film, which he described as “offensive to Islam and the Prophet (Muhammad).”
The film, which was produced by an Egyptian-born Coptic Christian who’s now a US citizen, sparked deadly protests that killed more than 50 people in more than 20 countries last year.
A court in Egypt has ordered that YouTube be blocked for a month for its refusal to take down the controversial 'Innocence of Muslims' video that triggered violent anti-American protests last September. Judge Hassouna Tawfiq ordered YouTube blocked for carrying the film, which he described as “offensive to Islam and the Prophet (Muhammad).”
The film, which was produced by an Egyptian-born Coptic Christian who’s now a US citizen, sparked deadly protests that killed more than 50 people in more than 20 countries last year. The court ruled the authorities must take measures to block access to the site for a month, after a complaint by an Egyptian who accused YouTube of being a “threat to social peace” by putting the US-made film on line.
Similar orders to censor pornographic websites deemed offensive have not been enforced in Egypt because of high costs associated with technical applications, although blocking YouTube may be easier to enforce. The Egyptian administrative court's verdict comes in response to a suit filed in September by Mohamed Hamed Salem, an Egyptian lawyer who demanded that YouTube be blocked until its administrators removed all anti-Islamic content. Human rights lawyer Gamal Eid said the decision to ban YouTube stems in large part from a lack of knowledge among judges about how the Internet works. YouTube’s parent company, Google, declined to remove the video from the website last year, but restricted access to it in certain countries, including Egypt, Libya and Indonesia, because it says the video broke laws in those countries. At the height of the protests, YouTube was ordered blocked in several countries, including Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia.
