Why Internet Access is a Human Right

In the January 4, 2012, print and online editions of The New York Times, Vinton G. Cerf published an op-ed titled “Internet Access is Not a Human Right.” He argued that “technology is an enabler of rights, not a right itself.” It was a well-meaning argument designed to limit human rights to the most important things. He says, “The best way to characterize human rights is to identify the outcomes that we are trying to ensure. These include critical freedoms like freedom of speech and freedom of access to information—and those are not necessarily bound to any particular technology at any particular time.”

The problem with this argument is that it is like saying, “You may have the water but you may not have any container or pipe to convey it or drink from.” The outcome one is trying to achieve cannot be dissociated from the means of achieving it. Although denying access to any container or pipe would not totally prevent use and consumption of the water, it effectively minimizes its usefulness.

The censors—those who seek to prevent freedom of communication—have two primary means of censorship: stifle the communication source or stifle the communication receivers. Effective censors do both. Denial of access to the Internet would both prevent the sources from posting messages and prevent receivers from receiving them.

When the printing press was invented and put into use, censors sought to shut down the presses and also prevent the publications from being distributed. Not only must the publisher be put out of business, so also must the published product be destroyed. Books were burned. In extreme cases it was a crime to read the censored books if you could get one. Was this censorship not a denial of freedom of speech? All it did was attack the technology used to distribute ideas and information, not the ideas or information itself. You could still whisper to your neighbor.

When radio, and later television, was invented and put into use, the censors sought to shut down the broadcasters and, in extreme cases, make it a crime to listen to or view what was broadcast. That is the case today in North Korea, where it is a crime to modify a government-issued radio so as to receive anything other than government-issued broadcasts. Is this censorship not a denial of freedom of speech? All it does is attack the technology used to distribute ideas and information, not the ideas or information itself. North Koreans can still whisper to their neighbors.

The Internet is the new printing press, the new radio, the new television. It is becoming the main means of communication throughout the world. If access to it is not a human right, then freedom of speech is not a human right, for there is no value to speech that cannot be read or heard by the audience that the speech is intended to reach. The Internet is now one of the essential means by which communication occurs. If there is freedom to communicate, there must be freedom to access the technological means of communication. Whispering to our neighbors is not enough. Since we regard freedom of speech to be a human right, access to the Internet should also be regarded a human right.