Taiwan has the fifth highest ranking for internet freedom globally and holds the top spot in Asia, while China remains at the bottom of the list, according to an annual report released Tuesday by the American non-profit organization Freedom House.
The organization’s 2022 Freedom on the Net report showed that the top ranked countries were Iceland, Estonia, Costa Rica, Canada, and Taiwan and the United Kingdom, in that order, during the one-year period that ended in May.
Taiwan retained the same ranking as last year, tied in fifth place with the U.K., in the Freedom House survey and analysis that ranks countries based on its assessment of obstacles to internet access, limits on content, and violations of user rights.
Among other Asian countries, Taiwan topped the list, while China was at the bottom of the rankings regionally and globally.
According to the report, Taiwan is an example of how the private sector can work with civil society, government entities and academia to design innovative responses to online danger.
In Taiwan, which faces a barrage of disinformation that can be traced to China, the popular Japan-based messaging application Line worked with civic groups to develop a tool for users to report false information trending on its platform, the report said.
The Taiwanese government launched a similar coordination effort following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, aiming to track war-related disinformation emanating from China, Freedom House said.
On the other end of the spectrum, China was listed as the worst abuser of internet freedom for the eighth consecutive year, below Iran and Myanmar.
The report said that internet censorship in China intensified during the 2022 Beijing Olympics and after Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai (彭帥) accused a high-ranking Chinese Communist Party (CCP) official of sexual assault.
The Chinese government has continued to tighten its control over the country’s booming technology sector, adopting among other measures new rules that require platforms to use their algorithmic systems to promote CCP ideology, the report said.
For this year’s report, Freedom House surveyed 70 countries, which account for 89 percent of the world’s internet users, and it ranked 17 as “free,” including Taiwan and Japan, while 32 were rated as “partly free,” and 21 as “not free.”
According to the report, global internet freedom declined for the 12th consecutive year, with the sharpest downgrades documented in Russia, Myanmar, Sudan and Libya.
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin dramatically intensified its ongoing efforts to suppress domestic dissent and accelerated the closure or exile of the country’s remaining independent media outlets, the report said.
In at least 53 countries, users faced legal repercussions for expressing themselves online, which often led to draconian prison terms, said Freedom House, a Washington-based non-profit organization that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom, and human rights.
Internet freedom improved, however, in a record 26 countries over the assessment period June 2021 to May 2022, the report said.
Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel