The national flag of New Zealand flies at half mast after Friday’s mosque attacks in Christchurch. IMAGE: Reuters / Jorge Silva
Video footage of killer Brenton Tarrant’s shooting spree at a Christchurch mosque on Friday – which left 50 worshippers dead – was pulled from Facebook immediately after the massacre. With the footage proliferating on several hosting platforms afterwards, the Kiwi authorities have already charged an 18-year-old man for sharing the video, as well as for posting other “objectionable” comments days before the shooting.
The teenager faces up to ten years in prison, under New Zealand’s ‘objectionable and restricted material’ laws. Police have meanwhile issued an overt threat to anyone else looking for the video.
“Do not download it. Do not share it. If you are found to have a copy of the video or to have shared it, you face fines & potential imprisonment,” read a statement from the police via local news source Wellington Live.
?New Zealanders threatened with 10 YEARS IN JAIL if they have the shooting video. ?
"Anybody found “knowingly” in possession of objectionable material can receive a maximum of 10 years imprisonment."
14 YEARS IN JAIL if you are a "dealer" of the video https://t.co/ZIlKtsUaKt pic.twitter.com/Jus4VLUvZB
— Nick Monroe (@nickmon1112) March 16, 2019
Under the objectionable material laws, corporations can be fined up to NZ$200,000 (US$173,000) for sharing the video or any related content. Unsurprisingly, New Zealand’s Internet Service Providers rushed to ban websites suspected of sharing the shooting-related materials since the tragedy.
We've started temporarily blocking a number of sites that are hosting footage of Friday’s terrorist attack in Christchurch. We understand this may inconvenience some legitimate users of these sites, but these are extreme circumstances and we feel this is the right thing to do.
— Telstra News (@Telstra_news) March 18, 2019
Reports from internet users across New Zealand say that 8chan – the site on which Tarrant announced his attack and posted links to his white nationalist manifesto – has been banned. Social discussion service Dissenter has also been banned, as has content sharing platform Bitchute. In neighboring Australia, ISPs have reportedly banned “cesspool of the internet,” 4chan.
Getting reports that New Zealand ISPs have banned https://t.co/3NwGyCZbgI until it is “censorship compliant,” despite the fact that Dissenter was in no way involved with this week’s tragic events in NZ. pic.twitter.com/IbL3s0gp1D
— Dissenter.com is ? by Gab (@getongab) March 16, 2019
Trolls and memers attempting to access Bitchute and 4chan were greeted with an Interpol notice warning that the sites in question are “distributing child sexual abuse material.”
I just got this trying to visit 4chan from Australia on a @Kogan (vodaphone reseller) connection.
It seems anything listed on https://t.co/3ErcoHowGY is being blanket shut down & anyone that tries to visit is labelled a kiddy diddler. pic.twitter.com/R9IeHOJCj6
— Davey G (@Goldsteinm8ty) March 18, 2019
Popular video sharing site LiveLeak has also been reportedly blocked – although its moderators explicitly said in a statement that they would not allow the live video of the shooting to be shared there.
Why did they ban liveleak in new zealand. They won’t even show the christchurch video. Ironically they’re one of the better sites when it comes to deplatforming shit like that pic.twitter.com/oqI8xJIUEk
— dehd (@WienerLover39) March 18, 2019
