4 4.2  meet its responsibility to respect human rights under the UN Guiding Principles, and may finding itself potentially contributing to government or non-state actors’ abuses of individuals’ human rights. Likewise, because the government does not have precise laws prohibiting hate speech, ICT companies may permit the transmission or hosting of expressions that would be considered incitement to national, racial or religious hatred. Understand the local context: It is important that ICT companies understand the context in which they are working and have processes in place to deal with Government and others’ attempts to restrict freedom of expression. They need to be able to assess whether the requests are legitimate and do not amount to censorship and to understand what may be hate speech and therefore appropriately prohibited or deleted on platforms or services. Moreover, many services that can be accessed in Myanmar are provided by international companies which are not based in the country, and they may not even have offices or staff on the ground. They may therefore not have experience of the country or be aware of cultural and political sensitivities or have the appropriate language capabilities to screen content posted on their site. Additional measures will need to be taken to ensure a realistic and systematic understanding of the local context, such as obtaining independent expert advice. (See Chapter 4.1 on Freedom of Expression). Different players in the ICT value chain will have different responsibilities: Operators/Telcos/Internet Service Providers (ISPs)   Put in place processes to deal with Government requests: Companies that provide Internet access may be asked by the Government to block access to whole websites due to the perceived spread of hate speech. 308 This reportedly happened in Myanmar during the riots in Mandalay in 2014. A high-ranking police officer said in an interview that the government had ordered the blocking of a popular social media website to stop the spread of “unverified news”, which coincided with a curfew imposed on Mandalay residents. 309 The reason for blocking the website was to prevent the spread of further rumours fuelling violence. However, as noted above, because Myanmar laws are often vague and not aligned with international human rights law, such requests may also cover legitimate expression that should not be blocked or taken down. It is currently unclear how requests for blocking websites are made to ISPs in Myanmar, either by law enforcement agencies directly or a request made through the regulator. It is also unclear under what circumstances requests to block whole websites can be made as there is little legislation covering this area and therefore ISPs appear to be voluntarily blocking websites. In other countries, the most common reason for blocking websites is related to child exploitation, terrorism or copyright infringement. Develop clear processes for blocking websites: In the example of the Government request above, the order to block this particular website would have been made to the operator or ISP providing Internet access. Blocking whole websites may prevent 308 Facebook’s Government Requests Report noted that in the period July-December 2014, the company “restricted access to 5 pieces of content reported by the President’s Office based on sections 295(A), 298, 504, and 505 of the Myanmar Penal Code, which covers "Acts or words which intentionally cause outrage or wound religious feelings" and "Statements or insults which intentionally provokes a breach of the peace or causes public mischief." https://govtrequests.facebook.com/country/Myanmar/2014-H2/ 309 Global Voices “Blocking Facebook: A Hot New Trend in Southeast Asia?” (11 July 2014). Original article in Burmese at http://burma.irrawaddy.org/interview/2014/07/04/61420.html. 148 PAGE CHAPTER 4.2: HATE SPEECH