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    Following petition to cut tuition, AZ State Univ. blocks access to petition website

    The Daily Caller – Fri, Feb 3, 2012

    It appears at least one American university has been taking lessons from deposed Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak.

    Arizona State University has blocked campus-wide access to popular petition-hosting website Change.org. The university claims the decision was made after the site was identified as a source of spam, but irate students say the action followed officials’ discovery of a petition requesting lower ASU tuition.

    “We have confirmed reports that Arizona State University blocked access to the Change.org website and are in the process of determining whether that block still exists,” said Ben Rattray, CEO of Change.org, in a statement provided to The Daily Caller.

    “Change.org provides a valuable platform for people across the world who want to take action on issues they care about, and it’s a shame that ASU intentionally denied students that service,” said Rattray.

    “The only other places we’re blocked are China and Iran, and the fact that ASU stooped to this level is pretty shocking,” he added.

    A Tumblr blog expressing outrage at the action accuses the university of engaging in shameless censorship.

    “Clearly, ASU does not want it’s [sic] students, faculty, or employees signing this petition,” says the blog, “and has resorted to BLATANT and UNLAWFUL Censorship in order to block the freedom of expression of it’s students and faculty.”

    Several commenters on the blog expressed doubt that the university’s decision had anything to do with spam.

    University officials told The State Press, “We respect the rights of all individuals to express their opinions. However, we must reserve the right to protect the use of our limited and valuable network resources for legitimate academic research and administrative uses.”

    Arizona State University officials did not immediately respond to TheDC’s request for comment. ASU has approximately 72,000 undergraduate students and thousands of faculty and staff members.

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