The Philippines’ Department of Information and Communications Technology’s (DICT) Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) extended the deadline for Discord and Reddit to respond to an ultimatum, and yet some of the country’s telecommunications companies blocked the two platforms anyway.
The CICC sent the letters on September 21, giving the two platforms a 24-hour deadline to designate a “resident agent or a local representative” or face restrictions or a complete block.
The agency said it was acting on the back of a series of school shootings, the latest of which happened on September 18 at Banga National High School in South Cotabato.
But both platforms responded within the given time frame, and the CICC said it was extending the deadline – and yet, the blocking had already begun.
The CICC head Paraiso explained the decision to extend the deadline by saying that both companies “responded within 24 hours and we want to give them the opportunity to work with us because what we want is accountability and a clear mechanism for the government to coordinate with the platforms.”
But he also warned, “While we welcome their commitment to work with us, we will not settle for anything less. This commitment must translate into concrete action, genuine accountability, faster response mechanisms and stronger protections for our Filipino children online.”
The CICC’s Executive Director Undersecretary Renato Paraiso announced the decision to extend the deadline on the agency’s website and Facebook page, and users of some of the country’s major ISPs – Globe, GOMO, TNT, and DITO – confirmed that Discord was inaccessible to them, while those using Smart and Converge could still reach the platform. Access to Reddit was also reported as being inconsistent, depending on the network.
No telecommunications company has published any blocking order, and the CICC is yet to explain why the block was put in place despite the deadline being extended.
According to the CICC, the “green lanes” it discussed with Reddit would cover “online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC), child abuse and exploitation materials (CSAEM), scams, misinformation, harmful content, and materials associated with Nihilistic Violent Extremism (NVE).”
This is a very broad and dangerous range of topics, going from child abuse to “harmful content” and “misinformation” – all of which is to be “fast-tracked” for removal.
Discord is a communication platform where gamers, but also study groups, student organizations, freelance clients, and small dev teams have their communities, years of conversation history, moderation rules, and member lists that cannot be moved to another service.
And now, some of these communities are cut off from the rest of the world, or rather, from the rest of their team, as some networks in the Philippines block Discord, while others do not. The same is true of Reddit. And nobody knows for how long this will last, or who is behind it, since no order has been published.
The extension came before the blocking started, which suggests the blocking was never really tied to the agency’s own ultimatum.
And the cost of this is being paid by the least “political” users – teenagers trying to participate in a tournament, students sharing notes, freelancers trying to reach their clients who will now have to use a VPN to get to the platforms, or lose their place in their respective communities.
