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from the you-can-do-anything,-but-you-can't-do-that dept.
Ars Technica reports that the European Court of Humans Rights has ruled Estonian news site Delfi is liable for hate speech posted in comments by users:
As the digital rights organisation Access notes, this goes against the European Union's e-commerce directive, which "guarantees liability protection for intermediaries that implement notice-and-takedown mechanisms on third-party comments." As such, Peter Micek, Senior Policy Counsel at Access, says the ECHR judgment has "dramatically shifted the internet away from the free expression and privacy protections that created the internet as we know it."
A post from the Media Legal Defence Initiative summarises the reasons why the court came to this unexpected decision. The ECHR cited "the 'extreme' nature of the comments which the court considered to amount to hate speech, the fact that they were published on a professionally-run and commercial news website," as well as the "insufficient measures taken by Delfi to weed out the comments in question and the low likelihood of a prosecution of the users who posted the comments," and the moderate sanction imposed on Delfi.
In the wake of this judgment, the legal situation is complicated. In an email to Ars, T J McIntyre, who is a lecturer in law and Chairman of Digital Rights Ireland, the lead organisation that won an important victory against EU data retention in the Court of Justice of the European Union last year, explained where things now stand. "Today's decision doesn't have any direct legal effect. It simply finds that Estonia's laws on site liability aren't incompatible with the ECHR. It doesn't directly require any change in national or EU law. Indirectly, however, it may be influential in further development of the law in a way which undermines freedom of expression. As a decision of the Grand Chamber of the ECHR it will be given weight by other courts and by legislative bodies."
[...]
As Access's Micek told Ars: "The website argued that its 'freedom to impart information created and published by third parties'—the commenters—was at stake. Delfi invoked its Article 10 rights to freedom of expression under the European Convention on Human Rights and the [ECHR] accepted the case."
Wiggin gives details that the claimant was a shipping company, an article concerning the operations of which attracted a large number of venomous comments. Despite the EUR30,000 claim for damages, the ECHR awarded non-pecuniary damages of EUR320.
Editor's Note: The ruling is not saying that all websites are accountable for all comments. In this case, the news site published an article which was intended to stir up public sentiment, and subsequently took no action when the user comments became so extreme as to fall under the 'Hate Speech' law. The publication of hate speech is an offence in Europe. Secondly, this occurred in Europe - claims that this has contravened the rights of people based upon the laws of other countries elsewhere are irrelevant. The Court accepted the news site's 'rights of freedom of expression' as covered by Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights.]
Original Submission
(Score: 2) by zugedneb on Wednesday June 17 2015, @07:58PM
Where is the personal responsibility? If you react to some perceived threat by doing something bad, you are solely responsible for that.
Do not know what the "you" above refers to...
All this is a question of things blown out of proportion by the media, and then some mindset having "right by default" in the light of these media-defined proportions.
Some people find these proportions convenient, and try to make a win.
Sometimes it backfires.
Like now, in sweden, the nationalists are on serious rise in politics.
Also, the state of the world is not my fucking fault.
I just tell about things the way I see them. Do not give incoherent or useless answers to me, because you do not like or understand what i wrote.
old saying: "a troll is a window into the soul of humanity" + also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ajax
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday June 17 2015, @08:00PM
You said: "My fucking point is, that without these white fucking muslims form ex yugoslavia, we would not even have a racist debate in sweden, and neither the stupid laws..."
You seemed to be blaming the stupid laws on people other than the people who create the stupid laws.
(Score: 2) by zugedneb on Wednesday June 17 2015, @08:07PM
Yes, partly I do.
As I said above, some try to make a win on the madia-defined proportions.
Some game the system and make laws based on media-defined proportions.
I don't see why I should not blame them...
old saying: "a troll is a window into the soul of humanity" + also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ajax
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday June 17 2015, @08:08PM
Because the people who write the bad laws are the ones who write the bad laws; that's their decision and no one else's. It's nonsensical to blame anyone else for the personal decisions of others.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by zugedneb on Wednesday June 17 2015, @08:22PM
I blame both the gambler/liar and the one that acts on it.
Those particular immigrants were gamblers/liars.
Then we have the media twisting the situation.
Then we have the SJW that passed the laws.
One should act in such a manner, that discouraging lies.
As I stated in some posts above, most of the faggots that speak up in media about their difficult situation lie, because sweden had/has not the type of culture where you harass pelple based on sexual preferense.
I do not say that there are no situations that are true, but I say that it is incredibly difficult to find some at an actual work place, or find anyone who have witnessed them.
The women who claim harrasment at universities mostly lie, in my eyes, because despite my over 8 years on campus, I have never witnessed this, or heard enyone i spoke to tell these stories...
Except the media, of course...
So, still, i do not see any reason not to blame the liars.
old saying: "a troll is a window into the soul of humanity" + also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ajax
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Wednesday June 17 2015, @10:10PM
Then you need to understand the concept of personal responsibility. For example, in the US, we have the TSA. It's not even slightly the fault of the 'terrorists' that government thugs are violating people's fundamental liberties at airports; it's the fault of the politicians who personally chose to vote for the legislation. Likewise, with whatever stupid laws you're talking about, the blame for their existence falls solely on those who vote for it, as they make the decision to do so themselves. No one is forcing them to vote for bad laws.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2015, @03:15PM
But the people working for the TSA weren't forced to do so, right? So how can you blame the politicians? They just wrote a text, a specific type of text known as "law" but still just a text. If everyone ignored that text, that text would have exactly no effect. So it's not the fault of the politicians, because all they did was speech. And someone who just speaks (or writes) is not responsible for anything others do due to that speech, that was your point, wasn't it?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2015, @08:47PM
Not only were they not forced to do it, they went out of their way to volunteer to do it.
(Score: 2) by Anal Pumpernickel on Thursday June 18 2015, @10:00PM
But the people working for the TSA weren't forced to do so, right?
I blame the politicians for writing and voting for the bad laws, and the people working for the TSA for accepting a job that involves them violating the fundamental liberties of everyone who wants to get on a plane. The statement in the comment you're replying to could be reworded to fit that logic, but that is all.