FREE SPEECH CHOKED

PayPal service closes accounts that violate 'acceptable use' policy [read 'unacceptable politics]:

"Paypal has frozen the account we [Freenet] use to accept donations over the web, they refuse to give any reason other than "use of an anonymous proxy", which suggests that someone at Paypal took a dislike to the goals of our project, since I have never used an anonymous proxy to access Paypal".

Freenet is free software which lets users publish and obtain information on the Internet without fear of censorship. To achieve this freedom, the network is entirely decentralized and publishers and consumers of information are anonymous. Without anonymity there can never be true freedom of speech, and without decentralization the network will be vulnerable to attack.
Communications by Freenet nodes are encrypted and are 'routed-through' other nodes to make it extremely difficult to determine who is requesting the information and what its content is.
At about the same time PayPal froze the account of the anti-war (among other interests) website Cassiopaea.org because PayPal's policy "prohibits the sale of items which graphically portray violence or victims of violence, and lack substantial social, artistic or political value."

PayPal Sucks: For anyone with an issue to raise with PayPal their number can be found by: clicking on "help" at the top of their page and then "contact us" at the bottom/left of their page, then "Customer Support Inquiries," near the middle of the page, then "Service Center" under the "Help by phone" toward the bottom/middle of the page. There you will find their non-toll free number. Obviously they intentionally make their phone number very difficult to find in order to save costs.

Paypalwarning.com reports that Paypal is currently being investigated by regulatory authorities in three US states.

[The lockdown of the internet is taking place right now. Web sites such as Cassiopaea.org and Freenet have no recourse against this censorship. While many have been expecting a sort of "Internet 9/11" event, the powers that be have already begun clamping down.]