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SMS banned in Cambodia during election run-up

by Sean Cooper posted Apr 3rd 2007 @ 7:35AM

Cambodia's National Election Committee had mobile providers bump their SMS services offline over the weekend to impose a government sanctioned "~~Censorship and State Control~~ tranquility period." This SMS blackout period was said to prevent voters from being spammed by the various parties during the election's final hours; no word on if this has happened in the past. This type of mobile banning has some history in Cambodia where 3G was axed for fear of it becoming a platform for the proliferation of adult content. Mobitel, Cambodia's largest provider did provide customers with a few hours notice, but with SMS costs so low compared to voice -- about 2 cents per message -- this service outage likely left many without an affordable means of communication. We aren't sure if this is too obvious, but shouldn't the various candidates just behave themselves and allow the entire population of the country get on with their business? Service was set to be restored shortly after the polls closed at 3 PM.

Cambodia bans 3G phones for fear of porn

by Chris Ziegler posted May 26th 2006 @ 12:37PM

Note to self: don't send MMS porn to heads of state or their spouses. Not ever. Unfortunately for tech-savvy Cambodians, someone already ruined their fun when Prime Minister Hun Sen's wife and her friends complained that their phones were suddenly rife with the XXX stuff. Never one to put technology before morality, the Southeast Asian nation swiftly banned its freshly-launched 3G network, because "We can wait 10 more years until we have managed to improve morality in society," so sez the boss. Yikes! If being forced into 1xRTT and EDGE purgatory for the next 10 years isn't a good reason to overthrow the government, we don't know what is.