Author Profile
Rebecca MacKinnon
1969 • American • Journalist
40
Total Quotes
Top Topics
Collected Meditations
Showing 40 quotesWikiLeaks published the Afghan War Logs and U.S. diplomatic cables stolen from a classified network by an Army private.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
War
Each of us has a vital role to play in building a world in which the government and technology serve the world's people and not the other way around.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Technology
As it turns out, American-made technology had helped Mubarak and his security state collect, compile, and parse vast amounts of data about everyday citizens.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Technology
Over time, if you want rights, you have to also show that you can use them responsibly and that you can build a positive world in the online space, and that's also very important.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Positive
Every year in China, Internet executives are officially rewarded for their 'patriotism.'— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Patriotism
It becomes dangerous for somebody who doesn't want their boss to know their sexual preference to use online networks to push for laws supporting gay marriage or same-sex partner rights if they can't do so with a pseudonym.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Marriage
If they lose their legal basis for owning a .cn domain, google.cn would cease to exist, or if it continued to exist, it would be illegal, and doing anything blatantly illegal in China puts their employees at serious risk.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Legal
Yahoo! had a choice. It chose to provide an e-mail service hosted on servers based inside China, making itself subject to Chinese legal jurisdiction. It didn't have to do that. It could have provided a service hosted offshore only.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Legal
There isn't much question that the person who obtained the WikiLeaks cables from a classified U.S. government network broke U.S. law and should expect to face the consequences. The legal rights of a website that publishes material acquired from that person, however, are much more controversial.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Legal
Thanks to the Internet in general and social media in particular, the Chinese people now have a mechanism to hold authorities accountable for wrongdoing - at least sometimes - without any actual political or legal reforms having taken place. Major political power struggles and scandals are no longer kept within elite circles.— Rebecca MacKinnon
Whether or not Americans supported George W. Bush, they could not avoid learning about Abu Ghraib.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Learning
For centuries, the Yangtze River - the longest in Asia - has played an important role in China's history, culture, and economy. The Yangtze is as quintessentially Chinese as the Nile is Egyptian or the Rhine is German. Many businesses use its name.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
History
When U.S. commercial interests press the Chinese government to do a better job of policing Chinese websites for pirated content, a blind eye is generally turned to the fact that ensuing crackdowns provide a great excuse to tighten mechanisms to censor all content the Chinese government doesn't like.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Government
As a condition for entry into the Chinese market, Apple had to agree to the Chinese government's censorship criteria in vetting the content of all iPhone apps available for download on devices sold in mainland China.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Government
I know plenty of people in China who don't like what their government does to the Falun Gong, but they don't want to entrust their data to the Falun Gong, either.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Government
The Chinese government sometimes shuts down the Internet and mobile services in specific areas where unrest occurs.— Rebecca MacKinnon
topics:
Government
In China, Vietnam, Russia and several former Soviet states, the dominant social networks are run by local companies whose relationship with the government actually constrains the empowering potential of social networks.— Rebecca MacKinnon
Any new legal measures, or cooperative arrangements between government and companies meant to keep people from organizing violence or criminal actions, must not be carried out in ways that erode due process, rule of law and the protection of innocent citizens' political and civil rights.— Rebecca MacKinnon