Origin and concept
In 2003 Streisand sued the photographer behind the California Coastal Records Project to have a photo of her house taken down. She lost, and after the lawsuit was reported the photo spread widely online. Masnick (2005) named the phenomenon the Streisand effect while criticizing a resort that tried to stop an online mention of its trademark. Jansen and Martin (2015) placed it within the backfire theory that Martin (2007) had systematized. In their account, censors typically try to dampen outrage in five ways: cover-up, devaluation, reinterpretation, official channels and intimidation. When the act of censorship itself is exposed and seen as unjust, attention and backlash grow. In digital environments, where copying and sharing cost almost nothing, this backfire happens far faster.
Psychological mechanisms
According to Brehm's (1966) psychological reactance theory, people who feel their freedom threatened become motivated to restore it and find the forbidden option more attractive. In an experiment by Worchel, Arnold and Baker (1975), merely telling participants that a speech had been censored made them more eager to hear it and shifted their attitudes toward its position. Hiding something is also read as a signal that there is something important to hide, which piques curiosity. When the media report a censorship attempt, an agenda-setting effect is added, and information once known to only a few becomes a public issue.
Empirical research and limits
Hobbs and Roberts (2018) showed that when China abruptly blocked Instagram in 2014, users adopted VPNs and other circumvention tools, which increased their access to other blocked sites such as Twitter and to politically sensitive information. They argued that sudden censorship can expand access to information. Pan and Siegel (2020) found that Saudi Arabia's arrests of dissidents failed to silence online criticism, and Nabi (2014) reported that tweets increased after Turkey's Twitter ban. Yet as King, Pan and Roberts (2013) and Roberts (2018) show, sophisticated censorship that selectively deletes posts with collective action potential, or adds only slight friction to accessing information, works effectively while drawing little public notice. The Streisand effect is thus a conditional phenomenon that mainly appears when censorship is visible and perceived as unjust.
FAQ
- What is the Streisand effect in simple terms?
- It's when trying to hide something makes far more people find out about it. It's named after Barbra Streisand, whose lawsuit to remove a photo of her house made the photo much more famous.
- Does censorship always backfire?
- No. Backfire is strongest when censorship is visible and looks unjust. Many studies find that subtle censorship, such as quietly deleting selected posts or making access slightly inconvenient, is quite effective.
Sources reviewed: 2026-10-26
References
- Brehm, J. W. (1966). A Theory of Psychological Reactance. New York: Academic Press.
- Worchel, S., Arnold, S., & Baker, M. (1975). The effects of censorship on attitude change: The influence of censor and communication characteristics. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 5(3), 227–239.
- Masnick, M. (2005, January 5). Since when is it illegal to just mention a trademark online? Techdirt.
- Martin, B. (2007). Justice Ignited: The Dynamics of Backfire. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
- King, G., Pan, J., & Roberts, M. E. (2013). How censorship in China allows government criticism but silences collective expression. American Political Science Review, 107(2), 326–343.
- Nabi, Z. (2014). Censorship is futile. First Monday, 19(11).
- Jansen, S. C., & Martin, B. (2015). The Streisand effect and censorship backfire. International Journal of Communication, 9, 656–671.
- Hobbs, W. R., & Roberts, M. E. (2018). How sudden censorship can increase access to information. American Political Science Review, 112(3), 621–636.
- Roberts, M. E. (2018). Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China's Great Firewall. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
- Pan, J., & Siegel, A. A. (2020). How Saudi crackdowns fail to silence online dissent. American Political Science Review, 114(1), 109–125.