Indonesia Issues Vimeo Ban, Cites Porn As Reason

We have seen the banhammer come down hard and fast in different countries for various online services, and YouTube is one of the more popular ones. Well, it seems that Vimeo is on the receiving end of the banhammer today as Indonesia has issued a ban on Vimeo, with the communications ministry accusing Vimeo of hosting pornographic content. Needless to say, the world’s most populous Muslim country has seen a slew of social media fury vented after this decision.

Apparently, it was the discovery of Vimeo pages that carried names such as “Art of Nakedness” and “Nudie Cutie”, which feature naked and scantily-clad women, that raised the ire of those in the seats of power, and in a statement published by the communications ministry, part of it read as follows, “We have recently received reports from the public about websites carrying negative and pornographic content… One of them is the site Vimeo.com.” This would mean Vimeo would join another 119 sites that have been previously banned because of content that has been deemed to be pornographic.

Vimeo shared via Twitter that the site was “blocked for some Indonesian users, but it’s on the Indonesian side and we can’t unblock it”. Most Indonesian social media were not too happy with this ban, and has lashed out at the powers that be for this move. Ah well, it does not seem as though anything is going to change soon though, which is rather unfortunate.

Three hours ago, Vimeo tweeted that they have received an official request from the Indonesian government, and would report back ASAP. To lose close to 250 million potential eyeballs because of a ban is not a nice thing to experience at all.

Edwin Kee
Categories: General
Tags: vimeo