VOA慢速英语:India Defends Moves Against Social Media

This is the VOA Special English Technology Report.

这里是美国之音慢速英语科技报道。

The government in India is defending itself against charges of Internet censorship. The move comes after the government last week asked companies like Facebook and Twitter to block more than three hundred websites.

印度政府正就外界指控其进行互联网审查做自我辩护。此举发生在印度政府上周要求Facebook和Twitter等公司屏蔽三百多个网站之后。

Officials accused the websites of posting edited images and videos of earthquake victims. They said the websites falsely claimed that the images were Muslim victims caught in recent ethnic conflict in India's northeastern Assam state and Burma. A number of the images were reportedly uploaded from Pakistan.

有关官员指责网站发布编辑过的地震灾民图像和视频。他们说，网站谎称这些图片是印度东北部阿萨姆邦和缅甸最近种族冲突中被抓的穆斯林受害者。据报道许多图片是从巴基斯坦上传的。

Officials said the panic that resulted caused thousands of Hindu immigrants to flee the area. They feared that Muslims would answer the false reports with attacks of their own.

有关官员表示，这引起的恐慌导致成千上万名印度教移民逃离该地区。他们担心穆斯林会用自己的攻击方式回应这些不实报道。

Cyber law expert, lawyer Pawan Duggal says this is the first time the Internet and mobile-phone technology have been used to create fear in a community.

网络法律专家、律师帕万·杜戈尔(Pawan Duggal)表示，这是互联网和移动电话技术首次被用于在一个社群中制造恐慌。

PAWAN DUGGAL: "India has to wake up to the need for putting cyber security as the number-one priority for the nation. Unfortunately, India does not even have a national cyber-security policy. The nation does not have any plan of action, should this kind of emergency happen again. "

杜戈尔：“印度必须醒悟过来把网络安全作为国家头号考虑的对象。不幸的是，印度甚至没有一项国家网络安全政策。国家没有任何行动计划，这类紧急情况还会再次发生。”

On Friday, India's Communication and Information Technology Minister Kapil Sibal dismissed charges that the government is trying to censor social media. But he said the misuse of social media has to be prevented.

上周五，印度通信与信息技术部部长卡皮尔·西巴尔(Kapil Sibal)驳回了政府正试图审查社交媒体的指控。但他表示要防止社交媒体的滥用。

Pranesh Prakash is program manager at the Bangalore-based Center for Internet and Society. He says some of the Web pages that have been blocked included official news websites.

普拉纳什·普拉凯斯(Pranesh Prakash)是总部位于班加罗尔的印度互联网与社会中心的一名项目经理。他表示，一些网页被屏蔽，其中包括官方新闻网站在内。

PRANESH PRAKASH: "I am not questioning the motivations of the government which in this current case seemed to be above board. We found that most of the material that they have complained about is actually stuff that is communal. But I do feel that the government went overboard in doing so, that it has also curbed legitimate reportage."

普拉凯斯：“我并没有质疑政府的动机，在当前情况下，它看上去是光明正大的。我们发现他们所抱怨的实际上是种族间的事情。但我觉得，政府在操作过程中有点鲁莽行事，这也限制了合法的新闻报道。”

He says some of the websites were uploaded by people trying to let others know that the edited images were false.

他说，一些网站的上传人是为了让其他人知道这些编辑过的图像是假的。

The government in India has called on social media companies to come up with a plan to keep offensive material off the Web. Last year, it passed a law that requires companies to remove so-called "objectionable content" when requested to do so.

印度政府要求社交媒体公司拿出一份方案隔绝攻击性材料。去年，政府通过了一项法律，要求各公司在收到通知时移除所谓的“不良内容”。

A Google Transparency report says that last year India topped the list of countries that make such requests. Supporters of online freedom have expressed concern that India may be restricting Web freedom.

谷歌透明度报告表示，去年印度在做出这类要求的国家中高居榜首。网络自由的支持者已经对印度可能会限制网络自由表示了关注。

About one hundred million people in India use the Internet -- the third-largest number of net users in the world.

印度大约有1亿人使用互联网，网络用户数量位居全球第三位。