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posted by martyb on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:49AM   Printer-friendly
from the waiting-until-they-try-to-legislate-"abhorent"-text dept.

Australia has rammed through another law requiring “abhorrent” video, audio or still images to be removed within an hour. This will apply to content providers both in and out of Australia as long as the content is available to Australians. Individuals and companies face jail time and/or huge fines if the content is not removed "within a reasonable time". If the content is found to be hosted in Australia then the Australian government must be alerted. This is yet another knee jerk reaction to the NZ shootings which were streamed live online.

Who is paying for someone to be awake at 3am to curate and remove this stuff?


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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:55AM (13 children)

    by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:55AM (#830894) Journal

    And that is the reason for the courts, and why the actual law does not specify a timescale. What might be deemed a 'reasonable' timescale for Youtube or FB could be very different from that expected of a small or individual's website.

    If companies are making huge amounts of money running their site then they should be able to afford better protection measures than a private individual who is running a site for the fun of it. The latter is not excused compliance, but I also don't believe that a court would expect him to provide a 24/7 response time for such requests.

    As I have pointed out elsewhere - the 1 hour time being quoted is entirely speculative on the part of the news source and based on a comment by the Attorney General who was referring to FB specifically. The is no specific timescale in the new law and it will be for the courts to decide what is 'reasonable' and 'expeditious' in each case.

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  • (Score: 4, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday April 17 2019, @10:45AM (1 child)

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Wednesday April 17 2019, @10:45AM (#830951) Journal

    And that is the reason for the courts, and why the actual law does not specify a timescale.

    Hmm, yes, except Australia only has kangaroo courts.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:20PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:20PM (#830996)

      Nah, mate, only paddocks, courts are high maintenance.

  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:52PM (7 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:52PM (#831012) Journal

    And that is the reason for the courts, and why the actual law does not specify a timescale. What might be deemed a 'reasonable' timescale for Youtube or FB could be very different from that expected of a small or individual's website.

    So why isn't "never" considered an appropriate timescale? I think this is particularly vile in light of freedom of speech. Even if the law somehow never gets abused directly, it still mandates that every content provider of this sort have censorship apparatus in place that can be invoked by another party very quickly.

    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by janrinok on Wednesday April 17 2019, @02:10PM (6 children)

      by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @02:10PM (#831023) Journal

      The courts might decide that 'Never' is appropriate sometimes. You are making assumptions.

      And I suspect that you are an American? Your views on freedom of speech are not shared by other countries, and your laws regarding freedom of speech are not applicable in other countries. And while we are discussing your freedom of speech, what about Assange? An Australian who is accussed of committing a crime outside of the USA. but the US does not support his right to speak of things that have embarrassed the US Govt, They seem determined to enforce US 'justice' to everyone no matter who or where, even those to whom US laws do not apply. The information was provided by Manning, who has been punished. That is a strange view of freedom of speech, in my view. If Assange had been a Russian living in Russia, would the US still be trying to extradite him with any expectation of success?

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday April 17 2019, @02:54PM (1 child)

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @02:54PM (#831058) Journal

        The courts might decide that 'Never' is appropriate sometimes. You are making assumptions.

        "May". That's not in the law now (I doubt the enforcers will agree that "never" is a reasonable period of time).

        • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:58PM

          by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:58PM (#831229) Journal
          There is no time limit specified in the law at present - so never is not excluded either, although I accept that it is most unlikely.
      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:54PM (3 children)

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @05:54PM (#831182) Journal

        Your views on freedom of speech are not shared by other countries, and your laws regarding freedom of speech are not applicable in other countries.

        Flat Earthers have views on the shape of the Earth which is not shared by others too.

        At some point, you have to decide what's important to you, laws or speaking your mind without concern that some bureaucrat or personal enemy will find a way to punish you for that and/or hide your speech. Here, freedom of speech is an issue no matter what the rules of the land are. The law supposedly targets "abhorrent" content. But what happens down the road when your criticism of a government policy becomes the abhorrent content? What happens when the forum you wrote your criticism decides to excise your inconvenient words using the excuse that it violates their terms of service (even though you aren't)?

        If you live in a society that you would like to become and stay a democracy, then you need really broad freedom of speech even if the "viewpoint" is otherwise.

        • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:07PM (2 children)

          by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:07PM (#831239) Journal
          IMHO, most of Europe and elsewhere has laws regarding freedom of speech which are less permissive in specific instances than the US law. There are already laws covering hate speech, incitement to commit various offences, supporting terrorism and others. It doesn't mean that those nations want to change their laws, or that democracy in those countries will collapse in the future. Freedom of speech is a spectrum but no nation on earth that I am aware of permits free speech entirely, not even the USA. Knowing and speaking about specific information can be restricted to a subset of the community. e,g. classified information etc
          • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:22PM (1 child)

            by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday April 17 2019, @07:22PM (#831254) Journal

            It doesn't mean that those nations want to change their laws, or that democracy in those countries will collapse in the future.

            Those nations aren't Australia. Australia has passed this law, indicating intent to change laws on free speech. Further, it's worse than most such laws because it mandates the creation of censorship apparatus which can then be reused - we already have problems with that. This sort of thing does have the power in conjunction with other underminings to collapse democracy.

            Freedom of speech is a spectrum but no nation on earth that I am aware of permits free speech entirely, not even the USA.

            Even North Korea is on that spectrum. It permits some forms of speech after all. It's not a valuable observation to make.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:50AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:50AM (#831444)

              You are Australian?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:50PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @06:50PM (#831219)

    " protection measures"

    protection from what, you authoritarian fuck? freedom of speech?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @07:16AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @07:16AM (#831539)

      Protection against reckless speech, you dimwit.
      Even the mighty US has such protection, see "shouting fire in a crowded theater just for lulz".
      Other countries may consider reckless as they see fit to their conditions.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:47AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 18 2019, @12:47AM (#831441)

    How long will a small site last after being taken to court repeatedly?