Does Internet Censorship Reduce Crime Rate?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21512/commit.v9i1.1661Keywords:
Internet Censorship, Crime Rate, Educa-tion, Conflict CensorshipAbstract
The study examines the relationship between Internet censorship and crime rate. Classical views of censorship suggest that filtering contents that are per- ceived as negative such as violence and pornography can have a negative impact on crime rate. However, there is no evidence to suggest any causal relationship between censorship and crime rate. The Internet has made it easier for individuals to access any information they want, and hence Internet Censorship is applied to filter contents that are deemed negative. We discussed several approaches that may be used to estimate the relationship between Internet Censorship and Crime Rate, and we decided to use OLS. We found that Conflict Internet Censorship is the only type of Internet censorship that has a significant negative impact on Crime Rate. Furthermore, it only significantly affects Crime Rate for highly educated countries.
Plum Analytics
References
OpenNet. (2013) (a) about filtering. retrieved june 15, 2015, https/::opennet.net:about-filtering; (b) oni country data 2013-09-20.xlsx [data file]. retrieved june 16, 2015, from https://opennet.net/ research; (c) opennet initiative internet censor- ship data. retrieved june 15, 2015, from https:// opennet.net/sites/opennet.net/files/README.txt.
S. Colaric, “Children, public libraries, and the internet: Is it censorship or good service,” North Carolina Libraries, vol. 61, no. 1, p. 6, 2009.
A. J. Bridges, “Pornography’s eeffect on inter- personal relationships,” Ph.D. dissertation, De- partment of Psychology, University of Arkansas, 2009.
OAIC. (2013, September) Background paper: Human rights in cyberspace. Australian Human Rights Commision. Retrieved on June 18, 2015. [Online]. Available: https://www.humanrights.
gov.au/sites/default/files/document/publication/ human rights cyberspace.pdf
D. Charoen, “The analysis of the computer crime act in thailand,” International Journal of Infor- mation, vol. 2, no. 6, 2012.
Economist, Ed., How Does China censor the Internet?, 2013, retrieved June 18, 2015. [Online]. Available: http://www.economist. com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/04/ economist-explains-how-china-censors-internet
C. J. Ferguson, Violent crime: Clinical and social implications. Sage Publications, 2009.
C. J. Ferguson and R. D. Hartley, “The pleasure is momentary the expense damnable?: The influ- ence of pornography on rape and sexual assault,” Aggression and Violent Behavior, vol. 14, no. 5, pp. 323–329, 2009.
C. Bitso, I. Fourie, and T. J. Bothma, “Trends in transition from classical censorship to internet censorship: selected country overviews,” Innova- tion: journal of appropriate librarianship and information work in Southern Africa: Information Ethics, no. 46, pp. 166–191, 2013.
Numbeo. (2015) About crime indices at this website, http://www.numbeo.com/crime/indicesexplained.jsp; crime index for country 2013, http://www.numbeo.com/crime/rankings by country.jsp?title=2013-Q1. Retrieved on June 16,
W. Bank. (2015) The world bank databank. [Online]. Available: http://data.worldbank.org/ indicator
L. Lochner and E. Moretti, “The effect of edu- cation on crime: Evidence from prison inmates, arrests, and self-reports,” National Bureau of Eco- nomic Research, Tech. Rep., 2001.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
a. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License - Share Alike that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
b. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgment of its initial publication in this journal.
c. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work.
USER RIGHTS
All articles published Open Access will be immediately and permanently free for everyone to read and download. We are continuously working with our author communities to select the best choice of license options, currently being defined for this journal as follows: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike (CC BY-SA)
