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Standard article misleading and inaccurate
Samir Shasha, Chief Executive Officer, ZOL
June 05, 2004

This is going to be another long email. The gist of it is that the news report about "eavesdropping" and "censorship" as a result of a proposed amendment to our Franchise agreement with TelOne is out of context and sensationalized information designed to create unnecessary and unproductive paranoia. But I am angry at the perpetrators of such false reporting and feel that our customers who are already stressed by the daily rigors of life should be spared such irresponsible and inaccurate information. Bottom line, you don’t need to worry – certainly not yet – but if you are interested read on.

I have been out of country for about 10 days but I returned to some distress. First, because there have been hiccups in ZOL’s service that were not reported on time to me or to our customers, but that has to be the subject of another groveling and apologetic email. Suffice it to say if you have had problems with slow browsing, accessing secure sites, or sending jpeg files, or getting to Tucows – we should have been aware of these problems and should have let you know sooner. By the end of the weekend, these problems should be solved.

A far more annoying and pressing issue is the article, "State moves to block offensive e-mails" written by Caiphas Chemhete and published in The Zimbabwe Standard on 30 May 2004. The report is irresponsible, inaccurate, out of context, and serves no purpose but to stoke the discomfort many already feel. I have a healthy dose of paranoia which I have openly shared with my customers, but this article is absurd! Unfortunately, this report was also blindly mirrored by the international press, again without verification and research.

The article appearing in The Zimbabwe Standard clouds our ability to negotiate a commercial agreement to the advantage of ZOL and our customers. What I can assure our customers is that any upstream obligation which we subscribe to will be well-known to them in black and white, not in jaundiced newspaper articles.

The contract amendment which the Standard reporter refers to, and quotes out of context, is a proposed amendment to an existing commercial contract, not a law being passed in Parliament or by the "State". If and when ZOL signs any such agreement we would have to make a part of our agreement with our own customers. Hence such an agreement must be commercially acceptable, practical, and legal. Our reading of this paragraph of the proposed amendment is that it is TelOne’s attempt to protect its network (to which we are connected) from malicious technical attacks, publishing pornography, and copyright infringement, not to oblige us to censor and monitor the content of emails. In our opinion, it has been poorly written and we do have problems with the wording of some sections if not entire sections, but that is why it is a proposed amendment not an imposed contractual obligation and subject to negotiation and clarification.

In his closing paragraphs, Chimhete goes even further in his poorly researched article to increase paranoia by taking yet another event out of context. At least he doesn’t quote "impeccable sources": If Chimhete has an opinion, he should write an editorial not an article.

He writes, "In the past few weeks, Internet users have complained about blocked e-mail messages mostly those that carried political information. One such blocked e mail was from the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)'s information department destined to several subscribers. "The following mail was blocked since it contained sensitive information," read part of the blocked mail, "Recipient, content filter has detected sensitive e-mails."

This above email was stopped by no "authority" other than the ISP or mail server used by the MDC to send these emails: eworld.co.zw! This email was caught as SPAM by eworld (www.eworld.co.zw) located on 77 Jason Moyo Avenue – not by someone in some government organization who was trying to "eavesdrop". The service provider used by the MDC determined that the article was considered SPAM! Note the relevant part of the headers of one such "blocked e mail" forwarded to us by a customer:

Subject: Spam mail warning notification! (Anti-Spam)
Date: Fri, 04 Jun 2004 08:30:43 -0200

Source mailbox: <info@mdczimbabwe.co.zw>
Destination mailbox(es): <media@mdc.co.zw>
Policy: Anti-Spam
Action: Delete

The point is that the email was blocked before it went out by e-world’s mail server. We had a similar problem on our own mail server – we addressed and explained the problem. SPAM is a scourge and false-positives can occur, but a service provider should decide if it trusts its own subscribers or not. It certainly isn’t evidence government censorship as strongly suggested by this reporter.

Chimhete writes, "An information technology expert said it was possible for government to eavesdrop e-mail messages as most of them are routed through TelOne."

I would think that a responsible journalist should deal with the "probable" and not the "possible". To claim censorship because of this event after consulting an "expert" is beyond absurd. It shows a poor standard of professional journalism and borders on – in fact it sits smack dab in the middle of – sensationalism. It is also possible that the Zimbabwe government can send a space ship to the moon, but not probable. I would recommend that Chemhete deploys some thought and research before writing or quoting garbage – how can someone think that an eavesdropper would actually admit that they are eavesdropping?

I subscribe to the philosophy that, "Just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean nobody is after you", but let’s save our paranoia and our outcries for betterment of ICT in Zimbabwe. Let us do our best to protect against the politicization of the Internet not give rise to it. Remember, regulators are equally paranoid and such false accusations only serve to confirm their paranoia. Internet penetration in Zimbabwe is miniscule – less than half a percent of the population has direct Internet Access. In my wildest imagination, I can’t believe the "State" is really interested in investing millions to control it.

ZOL must abide by the law, and we will make sure that our customers are aware of the law that applies to their conduct on the Internet. I should make it quite clear that contract or no contract we will cooperate with international or local authorities operating within the confines of the law. We will deploy best efforts (as requested by the amendment) to assist in identifying a ZOL member who engages in child pornography, copyright infringement, the hacking of Networks, or any activity that would interfere with the uninterrupted operation of the Internet. In fact, if I find you, I will close you down before any authority asks me to. So if that’s what you are doing, don’t do it! These are illegal activities the world over (or should be) and no ISP can claim rights of privacy over the right of society to be protected from sick people who start viruses, initiate attacks on networks, and engage in exploitation of innocent children.

By the same token, I will not knowingly let ZOL be party to what I don’t agree with or goes against my conscience –as a ZOL subscriber, I’m sure you already know that by now. Zimbabwe Law also requires us to do our best to protect our customers’ privacy which we guard very carefully. This is why if you have ever lost your password, you have to struggle to recover it when you call ZOL.

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