The Ethics of Censorship based on Islamic Perspective: The Impact towards Intellectual Freedom

In the name of Allah, most Gracious and most Merciful. There are numerous reasons why countries conduct the censorship upon information access through legal regulation, for example the protection of social norm, the restriction of the opposition movement, securing government assets, preserving the individual right of privacy and religious compliance. However, the absolute or even partial authority of controlling the information circulation has a tendency to be misused for the sake of private interest, which can lead to the instability of economy and politics in the long run. There is no doubt that censorship should be carried out in a number of cases like for preventing cyber crime or defamation. The purpose of this study is to explore the proper mechanism in implementing the censorship strategy to obtain the intended objectives by looking deeply and extensively the guidances based on Islamic perspective in relation to the ethical concern, which consist of moral commandments, accountability of rulers, social values, progressive benefits, equality of treatment and community interest. On the other hand, the clear distinct between the sacred text and sayings with individual roles has openned the discussion upon the limit of intellectual freedom. Thus, the analysis on the impact should be presented to depict the clear picture on the relationship between the activities that should and should not be done in order to prevent worst case scenarios.