Saudi Arabia

According to Reporters Without Borders, Saudi Arabia ranked 158 out of 179 countries in the 2012 Press Freedom Index. Strict censorship is maintained on news and information to preserve the control of the royal family and the religious establishment over the country. Self-censorship is high among journalists because of the insecurity in reporting and publishing.

There are more than 400,000 websites on the Saudi official Internet blacklist, including political, religious, and pornographic sites.

In 2009, the Lebanese LBC Channel in Jeddah was shut down for airing an episode on the promiscuity of a Saudi man. The man was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison and to hundreds of lashes. The reporter was sentenced to 60 lashes but was later pardoned by the King. In 2011, the young independent team of a YouTube program were arrested for several days for airing an episode on poverty in Saudi Arabia. A university professor, Mohammad Alabdulkarim, was jailed for several months for writing an online article revealing the corruption, and questioning the legitimacy, of the royal family. In 2012, a poet and journalist, Hamza Kashgari, was brought from another country and imprisoned for tweets considered offensive to religious scholars, in which he expressed personal views of the Prophet. Any foreign journalist or correspondent reporting from the kingdom must be accompanied by official minders to report on their work.