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Vietnam ARTICLE 19 TikTok had agreed to strengthening child protection measures and to ‘coordinating communication efforts’ with the government, but that it had not agreed to allow Vietnamese legal entities to address content violations according to government requests, citing a lack of Vietnamese legal regulations on this point. 133 If this is accurate, TikTok may be negotiating to some degree over new requirements, but overall it can be expected to comply, given that its content moderation was ‘already more localised than that of other social media platforms’. 134 TikTok itself said in a statement that it would ‘respect local laws and regulations’ and would continue to collaborate with relevant authorities.135 TikTok is particularly vulnerable to government demands because it has established a local office – a step major Western social media companies have so far resisted, partly due to concerns over government arrest or intimidation of local employees.136 Netflix, however, is set to open a local office soon, following a new 2022 rule requiring video-on-demand services to obtain a local licence and open a local office. Amazon Prime Video has since exited the country, presumably to avoid complying with this requirement. 137 If Vietnam is aggressive in implementing the local office requirement for other companies – a possibility following Decree 53/2022 – it may similarly force them to choose between compliance and exit. Tech companies are also subject to indirect pressures via advertisers. In 2019, the Ministry of Information and Communications said that it had sent letters to 100 local and foreign brands warning them to stop advertising next to anti-state content on YouTube.138 More recently, following regulations which tightened advertising rules, Vietnam drafted an optional whitelist and mandatory blacklist of sites which can and cannot receive advertising revenues based on whether they have posted ‘illegal’ content. 139 Advertisers have pulled advertisements in response to these measures, creating added commercial incentives for tech companies to remove content that the government finds objectionable. Google and Facebook have agreed to comply with at least some advertising-related demands, although detailed information on this is not publicly available.140 ____________________________________________ 133 VietnamNet Global, Vietnam Urges TikTok to Rectify Its Violations in Vietnam, 8 December 2023 (citing the deputy director of the Authority of Broadcasting, Television and Electronic Information). 134 Le, Vietnam Pressures TikTok. 135 N. Quynh, Vietnam Says TikTok’s Content Censorship Isn’t Effective: Media, BNN Bloomberg, 5 October 2023. 136 F. Potkin and P. Nguyen, Exclusive: Netflix Making Preparations to Open Vietnam Office, Reuters, 24 February 2023; Le, Vietnam Pressures TikTok. 137 Potkin and Nguyen, Netflix Making Preparations; L. Quy, Amazon Prime Video to Leave Vietnam, VN Express, 16 October 2023. 138 J. Reed, Vietnam Tells Companies Not to Advertise on YouTube Videos, Financial Times, 12 June 2019; AFP, Vietnam Warns YouTube Advertisers over Anti-State Channels, France 24, 25 June 2019. 139 Y. Seck, Vietnam: White List for Online Advertising Services Released, Baker McKenzie, 23 March 2023; L. Hoang, Vietnam to Block Ads on ‘Toxic’ Online Content in Further Crackdown, Nikkei Asia, 9 December 2022. 140 Freedom House, Freedom on the Net 2023 (citing Vietnamese sources). 35

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Engaging tech for internet freedom in authoritarian countries

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Internet Restrictions

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Article 19

Date Published: Oct 5, 2024

Abstract: In this report, ARTICLE 19 reviews the human rights context and responsibilities of tech companies operating in 3 authoritarian countries in Asia, namely China, Myanmar, and Vietnam. It focuses on the rights to freedom of expression and privacy, and the manner in which authoritarian states directly or indirectly expect companies to assist them in censoring content, promoting propaganda, accessing user data, and engaging in surveillance. While these are undoubtedly highly challenging contexts, companies have not sufficiently prioritised protecting human rights in their policies and actions. States are the primary duty bearers under international human rights law, but companies also have human rights responsibilities, as outlined in the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). Even if domestic law or circumstances make it impossible for companies to fully meet their human rights responsibilities, they should take action so as to respect human rights standards to the greatest extent possible. Tech companies should not merely reference local law as an excuse for collaborating in rights violations. They should take steps such as those detailed in this report, like adopting appropriate policies, asking governments to justify content removal requests clearly and specifically, and reporting transparently on their compliance with government demands. For each country, we survey the country context and provide an overview of legal obligations which companies operate under that are problematic from the perspective of international human rights law and that may, as a result, put pressure on companies to become complicit in violations of the rights to freedom of expression and privacy. We then explore how Western tech companies operating in these countries, many of which have explicitly stated their commitment to respecting freedom of expression and privacy, have responded to these legal obligations and to other government expectations that they will cooperate in violations of these rights.

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