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MANILA, Philippines -- One of the petitioners who filed the successful bid against the constitutionality of President Benigno Aquino III’s creation of a Truth Commission in 2010 filed another petition before the Supreme Court on Tuesday to stop the implementation of the newly enacted Cybercrime Law.
The petition of Louis “Barok” Biraogo asked the SC to issue a temporary restraining order against three specific provisions of Republic Act 10175, including the section that included libel in the crimes punishable under the new law.
The other provisions are Sections 12 and 20.
Section 4 [c] punishes libel “committed through a computer system or any other similar means which may be devised in the future.”
Section 12, on the other hand, authorizes law enforcers “to collect or record by technical or electronic means traffic data in real-time associated with specified communications transmitted by means of a computer system.”
Section 20 lists the penalties for non-compliance with the law.
Biraogo said the new law not only violates the Constitution but is also inconsistent with the Anti-Wiretapping Law.
"With the enactment of Republic Act No. 10175, cyber technology, once a boom to petitioner and the general public, is now subjected to subtle but pervasive State monitoring and control," the petition said.
He also said the enactment of the law “is attended with grave abuse of discretion because its questioned provisions contravene Sections 3 (1) (on inviolability of privacy of communication) and 4 (on freedom of speech, of expression, of the press, and peaceful assembly), Art. III (Bill of Rights) of the 1987 Constitution."
A separate petition citing similar grounds has also been filed by the ALAM party-list.
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