Democracy for Vancouver

Campaigners for freedom of speech on the internet have hailed a major breakthrough after Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! agreed to join a working group to draw up a code of conduct for protecting human rights
online.

Leading IT companies have been criticised for colluding with governments, such as China, Iran and Vietnam, that censor websites and persecute or jail bloggers. Amnesty International has highlighted the issue through irrepressible.info, a joint campaign with The Observer which has now received more than 60,000 pledges of support.

Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! will hold joint talks with organisations including Amnesty, Human Rights Watch and Reporters Without Borders, as well as academics, investors and Vodafone. The companies have announced
their ‘intention to seek solutions to the free expression and privacy challenges faced by technology and communications companies doing business internationally’ and plan to agree on a set of principles by the end of the year.

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