Live From North Korea!
What if objective reporting could be safely broadcast from anywhere including places where they might want to kill you?
News is supposed to be fresh, that’s why its called news and live news is the freshest content possible. But in some countries this is a technogical feat considered difficult if not impossible. Live TV-quality video reporting requires expensive VSAT technology and bulky video cameras that can’t exactly be bandied about in places like Pyongyang or Tehran without expecting arrest. Even low quality video over a third world internet connection just isn’t feasible.
Repression is becoming more and more commonplace even over Internet technology. Brutal attacks against bloggers, politically motivated surveillance, manipulation of web content, and restrictive laws regulating speech online are among the many threats to internet freedom that puts a muzzle to objective reporting.
As authoritarian rulers see that blocked websites and high-profile arrests draw condemnation, they are turning to murkier — but no less dangerous — methods for controlling online conversations. The battle over Internet freedom directly affects objective reporting and comes at a time when nearly one third of the world’s population is using the Internet. Governments are responding to the increased influence of this medium by seeking to control online activity, restricting the free flow of information, and otherwise infringing on the rights of users.
The methods of control are becoming more sophisticated, and tactics previously evident in only the most repressive environments — such as governments instigating deliberate connection disruptions or hiring armies of paid commentators to manipulate online discussions — are appearing in a wider set of countries.
Even if some amazing new technology could deliver live TV-grade video journalism, the field journalists must also be completely anonymous to protect their identity. So secure that their digital footprints must be untraceable, their content deeply encrypted, obfuscated, and cloaked in a fashion so its impossible to trace, identify, block, or decrypt.
In 2009, the Iranian authorities used tactics in a continued campaign against Internet freedom that began after their disputed elections. These tactics included: upgrading content filtering technology, hacking digital certificates to undermine user privacy, and moving closer to establishing a National Internet. Iranian judicial authorities also meted out some of the harshest sentences in the world for online activities, including imposing the death penalty on three bloggers and IT professionals.
It’s just not possible for organizations like CNN to broadcast anything but propaganda from places like Tehran, which is why they don’t even bother.
So whats the solution?
We are working on a new kind of live video reporting technology that can be streamed securely, remotely, and even without local internet connections. Something that is also safe for truly anonymous reporting so it should be possible to say “Live from North Korea!” or anywhere where repression exists.
Our approach to live reporting is so lightweight and so inobstrusive that all it takes is a GoPro camera, an iPhone, and a laptop sized device that completely bypasses the networks of repressive governments. The content live streamed to our broadcast datacenters using encryption and obfuscation that goes beyond the scope of most if not all government spying technology. Yet the quality is High Definition that you expect from CNN and the performance is blazing and affordable.
No more $50K VSAT terminals and TV trucks, no more expensive VSAT connections, and no more expensive and bulky video cameras. We are so lightweight and portable that television-grade live video reporting can occur even in the midst of a screaming crowd and nobody would be the wiser.
That’s a reporter’s dream and what we are working on at Talkback.tv. (and more).
