Online journalists | Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF)

Pakistan Press Foundation

Online journalists

Sir: This is with reference to a news item, ‘CPJ calls for protecting online journalists’ (Daily Times, February 23, 2012). As per the report, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has urged that a global coalition against censorship is needed to protect online journalists and bloggers who are being targeted by repressive governments. I agree wholeheartedly with the CPJ on this issue. We have seen that in the Arab countries and elsewhere, bloggers are targeted by autocratic regimes, making it difficult for people to write freely about what is going on in their part of the world. A lot of bloggers do not share their real identities with the world due to the fear of being harassed or targeted by their respective regimes. But autocratic regimes do have ways of finding out their real identities through IP addresses or other such ways. As if targeting mainstream journalists was not enough, now online journalists are also under threat in many countries. This trend must be curbed at the earliest.

KINZA AKHTAR

Daily Times