In February 2019, the Philippines’ National Bureau of Investigation arrested the CEO of Rappler,
Maria Ressa, over a cyber-libel case filed against her by businessman
Wilfredo Keng. Ressa’s camp argued that the case is was invalid due to
the fact that the alleged article that caused the suit was published
months before RA 10175 Anti-Cybercrime Law has been put into effect. NBI
initially agreed but later found a caveat to push the case: the article
was “Updated” two years after it was originally posted on Rapppler’s website, in 2014.
Rappler then counter-argued that the prescription period of one year for filing a libel case has lapsed.
NBI presented several rebuttals: 1) that cyber-libel has a longer
prescription period of more than one year; 2) that the article is in a
state of “continuous publication” due to Rappler being an
internet-only news outlet, and thus every time the article is loaded on a
browser, it technically issues a brand new copy; 3) the Search Engine
Optimization (SEO) of Rappler which keeps its pages on top of search engines’ search results is also a form of continuous publication.
This article is a closer look at the reasons given by the law enforcers for Ressa’s arrest.
1. What is an “Updated Article”?
The article of Rappler was first published in 2012, but
later updated in 2014. The key issue here is that in 2012, it was
exempted from cyber-libel due to RA 10175 being a non-retroactive law.
But then the article was updated in 2014, when the law was already in
effect. Ressa claimed that the update was a “mere typographical
correction of a single letter that has not been capitalized in the
original.” Yet, if we look at the nature of how an update to articles
was made, it does not matter if the update changes only a letter or the
entire article.
The process of publishing an article online requires the entire text
to be saved in a database. A database is where all the data is being
saved, composed of tables and cells. A common interface for article
publication online presents a single textbox for the entire article,
thus the article is saved on a single cell in the table.
Now, what we call an “UPDATE” to a cell record in a database is
technically a combination of DELETE and SAVE function simultaneously.
This means, an updated article is indeed a brand new published article,
as the original one is basically DELETED.
Updated articles online usually do not retain the original version/s
for economic purposes. An exception to this is Facebook, which keeps all
previous versions of a post in their Edit History. Rappler
notably do not show copies of the original articles which means previous
versions of their articles are deleted, the updated version the ONLY
copy published. The dates of the original publication and the update are
just that: dates. The dates are the only data kept in database.
The bottom line here is that Rappler re-published the Keng
article in 2014, two years after RA 10175 is already a law. Whatever
excuse Ressa comes up for updating the article is inconsequential
because an updated article is a re-published article. Ressa could have
got a better defense if, instead of deleting and replacing the original,
they just issued an erratum below the original article, pointing to the
erratic text, like how traditional media do.
2. Continuous Publication
Continuous publication is an interesting subject, especially when it
comes to Rappler’s nature as an internet-only news outlet. To make sense
of this, let us look at the nature of how Rappler’s articles are
served: the same as any page of any website. That is, one load of an
article is a unique copy of an HTML document, which can be saved AND
PRINTED—which was one of the original functions of the WEB. Therefore,
one page load or reload is considered a preparation to print the page,
and it counts an instance of a published document. This makes a extra
sense in web development where bandwidths are metered every time a page
is requested by a visitor. One click to an article is considered a hit: a
request from Rappler’s servers to “SERVE and PUBLISH A COPY OF THE
ARTICLE” for that specific device trying to load the page.
If the article has already been deleted on the database, it could no
longer be considered published and each request would return a 404 (file
not found) response. This is not the case with the Keng article. Rappler
still serves the article as of February 2019. Rappler still earns from
ads on that page. Basically, Rappler continuously publishes the article
for profit.
The continuous publication, therefore, makes the date of the
publication of the original article and the updated article
insignificant as the prescription period, even if it is just one year,
is being RESET every time one loads the article on their device. And in
turn, they continually damage Mr. Keng’s reputation while Rappler earns more revenue, every time someone visits the said article.
And if that fact is not already daunting for news outlets that rely
on the internet, there is more. Articles can be saved into screenshots.
Each share of the screenshot across social media may also be considered a
re-publication of the article in a digital image form. Articles can be
shared. Each share of an article contains the headline and a summary of
the article, which, if found substantial, can also be considered a
re-publication of the article. On top of that all, we also have WEB
ARCHIVES. Web archives are copies of pages saved on archive websites
(like the Wayback Machine) which are saved for referential and
historical purposes. Archives’ main purpose is to preserve a copy of a
deleted web page that once served as a reference for another article.
Even if, say, you deleted an article on your website to evade
cyber-libel, your article may still be alive on these archives’ servers.
These can be used as evidences that you truly wrote the article, and
can also be considered an indirect continuous publication of the
article.
This much digital footprints that an article leaves once it has been
published online should prompt internet media outlets (and bloggers
alike) to be extra careful with the contents they put up on the web.
Nothing gets deleted on the internet. You have the right to remain
offline. Everything you do or say online can be used and will be used
against you. Maria Ressa and Rappler are now learning that the hard way.
3. Search Engine Optimization
SEO is a technical subject which has a wide array of sub-subjects. It
is also subdivided into black hat (illegal), white hat (legal) and grey
hat (sub legal, sub illegal.)
To explain it in layman, SEO is basically a game where you do certain
things to remain on top of search results (like the results of Google
search.) It’s simple, but its effects are astronomical in scale.
Let’s take Wilfredo Keng as an example. As a businessman, image is
one of the things important to the survival of his business. Now, if
someone uses Keng’s name as a search key, those that played the SEO game
best will appear highest on Google’s search results. Rappler
played this game a little further by being enlisted in Google News
directory. Websites in this directory are not only listed in a special
category of search results, they already have the advantage of listing
highest on general search results.
Every time Google shows a snippet of the Keng article published by
Rappler,the businessman is being brought under bad light, as well as his
business, if we follow Mr. Keng’s reasons for filing the case. And it
is not only Mr. Keng’s fight, as all his employees get affected every
time his businesses lose clients due to the article.
SEO therefore is a game that affects lives, LITERALLY. And Google
admitted on a recent article (published by 9to5Google) that they are
also struggling in cracking fake news from their search engine,
something that is not an easy endeavor. And that’s just Google alone.
We also have other search engines with slightly different, and weaker,
algorithms that can be easily played by SEO experts. Rappler, being an
internet-only news outlet, is no doubt aware of this game, being heavily
reliant on search results to gain reads. Snippets containing
substantial texts putting Mr. Keng in bad light can also be considered
continuous publication of the article. Furthermore, Google specially
saves “caches” of pages listed on their search engine which can be
considered another way that the article is being preserved and
disseminated to the public even at the event that Rappler’s website goes
down. Such snippets and caches are also part of Rappler’s overall
strategy.
To wrap it all up, Rappler has come a long way of destroying
Mr. Keng’s reputation for continuously publishing and distributing the
article in various ways, for more than seven years. Keng claimed to have
requested Rappler to take it down for many times, but the website still
kept the article up and available. And for Wilfredo Keng’s case, being
linked to drug syndicates and allegedly corrupt politicians is a big
damage of inexplicable degree, even more now that there is an ongoing
stigma brought upon by the government’s infamous “War on Drugs.” What
about those employees of Mr. Keng who may have lost their jobs as an
effect of Keng’s business losing clients?
As informed and educated people in our society, perhaps we should stop—even for a while—looking at the Rappler/Maria
Ressa vs. NBI/Wilfredo Keng’s case as an “attack on press freedom.”
Instead, let us observe how powerful the internet as technology can be.
And how, on the wrong and irresponsible hands, it can destroy the
reputation of one and the livelihood of many.
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