SEOUL — Prosecutors demanded an 18-month sentence Monday for a popular South Korean blogger who is accused of spreading false financial information in a case that has ignited a debate about freedom of speech in cyberspace. The 30-year-old blogger, a fierce critic of government economic policy, was arrested and indicted in January after he wrote that the government had banned major financial institutions and trade businesses from buying U.S. dollars. Prosecutors have said the posting was not only inaccurate, but it had affected the foreign exchange market and undermined the nation's credibility.

Bend your ears boys and girls for another of Baron von Münch-Kane’s once-spun yarns and twice-told tales. It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen when the cyber winds howled forebodingly at the Cybersecurity Act of 2009 introduced by Senators John Rockefeller and Olympia Snowe. The senators’ Big Brother law would allow government scrutiny over everything posted to the Internet, while granting the White House “unprecedented control over computer software and Internet services” and powers “to access private online data, regulate the cyber security industry and even shut down Internet traffic.”

The European Union wants new laws that would grant national governments the power to force ISPs to block child pornography. The move would enable the Home Office to impose filtering technology on small ISPs who say they cannot afford it, or argue it is ineffective. Article 18 of the proposal for an EU framework decision on "combating the sexual abuse, sexual exploitation of children and child pornography", states: "Each Member State shall take the necessary measures to enable the competent judicial or police authorities to order or similarly obtain the blocking of access by internet users to internet pages containing or disseminating child pornography, subject to adequate safeguards."

Beijing - An elderly retired professor is beaten black and blue by thugs, under the noses of the police, for stubbornly honoring the memory of an officially disgraced former leader. A well-known social commentator's website is shut down after posting articles moderately critical of arbitrary detentions. One of Beijing's biggest dailies has to remove from its website an editorial supporting citizen supervision of government – which government censors found unacceptable. This pattern of incidents over the past 10 days highlights a new wave of crackdowns that Chinese officials have launched to forestall any hint of unrest, as they brace for a string of politically sensitive anniversaries this year.