https://reclaimthenet.org/4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-uk-regulator-ofcom
Two of the internet's most free-speech supporting platforms, 4chan and Kiwi Farms, are taking their fight for online free speech to court, targeting the UK's communications regulator, Ofcom, for what they describe as an unconstitutional attempt to enforce British censorship laws on American websites.
In a lawsuit filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, the plaintiffs argue that the UK's controversial Online Safety Act is not only an unlawful extraterritorial power grab but a direct attack on foundational American liberties.
Read the complaint here [PDF].
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4chan and Kiwi Farms Sue UK Regulator Ofcom Over Online Censorship Law
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(Score: 5, Informative) by gawdonblue on Saturday August 30 2025, @09:17PM (11 children)
Britain can enact its own laws that apply in Britain. If those websites want to be viewed in Britain than they have to conform to British law.
The website companies have a few options, either:
1. Do nothing and risk getting banned in Britain
2. Do not display their website for British IP addresses
3. Change their website when getting viewed in Britain to follow British law
4. Change their website everywhere to follow British law, or
5. Put a big disclaimer on their websites saying that British people are not allowed to use it (and wait to see how long before it's banned)
A court in the USA is the wrong place to argue what happens in Britain.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2025, @11:03PM
> A court in the USA is the wrong place to argue what happens in Britain.
Well I mean, it's much less than the USA is doing to other countries.. restrictions on sales of chips with "American technology" in them somehow, for example? Issuing indictments against North Korean and Russians for breaking into American computers? Kim Dotcom? They've extradited people for Bitcoin drug sales too, I believe, and many other things. Wikileaks.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday August 31 2025, @02:49PM (1 child)
But it is the right place to argue what happens in the US. The argument appears to be that Ofcom is regulating US-based companies and US-based users neither whom have no presence in the UK. For example from the above linked complaint (verbiage follows):
It goes on, but this gives you a flavor of the petition. Looks like a good case for the plaintiffs to me, but the court doesn't have to take it seriously.
And of course, Ofcom is terrible law. But who is immune to that?
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday August 31 2025, @06:37PM
I'm not sure I understand this. I have four web sites, and I'm pretty sure the Nooze is breaking somebody's law somewhere.
Do these cretins expect British women to wear head scarves to conform to Sharia law? Or me to GIMP a headscarf on every woman whose photo I post on my journal site? Will the US extradite me to Britain if I break a British internet law?
Can someone explain this? It seems madness to me, on both sides.
The "patriotic" Defense Secretary Hegseth carries an American flag in his jacket's snot rag pocket.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday August 31 2025, @04:30PM
I don't think you read the complaint which is full of stuff like
Or just read all of pages 21 and 22, particularly:
The UK isn't even bothering to legally implement authoritarian censorship of people in other countries, they're just assuming jurisdiction over all citizens of the world and ignoring existing legal and extradition treaties. Essentially ofcom is declaring itself as acting above the law. A mere legal treaty between countries or a mere constitution of another country is irrelevant at their higher level... or so they say/act. They'll get away with it in their dystopian hellhole they've created for themselves in the UK but I don't think it will sell very well outside their crumbled failed empire.
(Score: 2) by stormreaver on Sunday August 31 2025, @07:46PM (6 children)
Your entire premise is fundamentally flawed. British law only applies to companies/people with a presence in Britain, and then only to the extent of the presence in Britain. British people viewing a U.S. website from Britain absolutely does NOT subject the U.S. website to British law.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2025, @08:12PM (5 children)
So if Brits access a computer site in the US then, equally, they shouldn't have to conform to US law. After all, they are not in the USA, they don't have a presence there. How do you thing that would work out? How has it been worked out in the past?
In this case I think that Moon has taken reasonable steps to limit UK access to his website. Ofcom have got this wrong. The UK needs to learn how VPNs work. Perhaps they should remove the ads for VPNs that are on UK TV? Maybe they are going to demand that only Ofcom approved VPNs should be used (and everyone will then know which ones to avoid!).
But I still don't believe that this should be subject to a lawsuit in a US court. US businesses SHOULD be subject to the laws in which they are doing business. But KiwiFarms isn't a business, it is only a website.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by darkfeline on Monday September 01 2025, @03:20AM (4 children)
> So if Brits access a computer site in the US then, equally, they shouldn't have to conform to US law. After all, they are not in the USA, they don't have a presence there. How do you thing that would work out? How has it been worked out in the past?
Uh, yes? That's exactly how it works now and in the past. You can't enforce laws on people outside your jurisdiction. The best you can do is try to convince the local government to do something. Barring that, you would have to invade the nation if you wanted to enforce your laws.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday September 01 2025, @06:57AM (1 child)
Julian Assange might disagree with you. Along with several others that a quick internet search will reveal. He never committed any crime in the US. He had never set foot in the US. His only "links" to the US were via the internet when US citizens accessed WikiLeaks.
But with regards to the other direction, Anne Sacoolas, committed a crime in the UK which resulted in a teenager's death and it took 3 years and intense diplomatic effort to get her to face justice. The pilot of a US military ac who flew into a ski-car cable in Italy which resulted in several deaths did not return to face Italian justice. There are many others.
So what it says on paper and how the US views itself seem to differ considerably.
I still believe Ofcom are wrong on this issue, but that doesn't change the ground rules.
(Score: 2) by stormreaver on Monday September 01 2025, @01:54PM
Julian Assange was a victim of classification. Note that the U.S. had to use diplomatic means to get to him, not the application of law. Everything you said was correct, and just highlights the power disparity around the world. If he had taken your or my personal information and published it, the normal rules would have applied as I described them. In essence, he would have been completely untouchable.
However, he chose to embarrass some of the richest and most politically connected people in the world. There is a separate set of rules for the very rich and politically connected vs. the average person. We only have rights against others not in a politically connected class. Julian stepped WAY outside of his political class, and he paid the price. It has absolutely nothing to do with laws for the rest of us.
Ofcom is politically insignificant, so they have to play by the regular rules.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Monday September 01 2025, @10:42AM (1 child)
So you can never prosecute anyone who breaks into a US military system while being in a foreign country, steals from a US bank, attacks the court system and publishes the Epstein list, or apply any sanction, etc. to them either because - technically - according to your definition, they haven't committed any crime in the US and aren't subject to its laws.
Yeah, that's not how it works.
It's not how it's ever worked.
It's not how it will work in the future.
If you're conducting business in the UK (i.e. UK viewers, taking UK credit cards, taking adverts from UK advertising agencies, etc.) then you're subject to UK law for that particular bit of your business.
EXACTLY the same way as basically every other country in the entire world operates their legal system.
(Score: 2) by stormreaver on Monday September 01 2025, @01:43PM
This happens all the time, and the most the U.S. can do is to apply sanctions against the criminal's U.S. assets, and immediately arrest him if he is ever within U.S. jurisdiction. The U.S. can also apply diplomatic pressure against the host country to turn him over. If the host country says "fuck off," then there's nothing the U.S. can do directly. This happens EVERY SINGLE DAY.
That is exactly how it works.
That is exactly how it has always worked.
That is how it will continue to work in the future.
The U.K. isn't entirely powerless (they can prohibit U.K. businesses/citizen from conducting business with me), but if I have no presence in the U.K., then they are otherwise just pissing in the wind. At worst, I will be unable to conduct business in the U.K. They can apply diplomatic pressure to the U.S. to have me extradited, etc.
(Score: 5, Informative) by echostorm on Saturday August 30 2025, @09:32PM (10 children)
from the KiwiFarms side, the owner of the website Josh has banned anyone from the UK from accessing the website completely, but that wasn't good enough for Ofcom, who has threatened him with incarceration because people are still finding ways to access it.
They want to lock up an American citizen running a legal American server, because people in the UK are using VPNs.
this isn't just a fight over a little law here, this is a fight for the entire future of the internet and personal liberties.
(Score: 5, Touché) by gawdonblue on Saturday August 30 2025, @11:01PM (3 children)
Do you really believe Britain be able to extradite a US citizen on laws that do not apply in the USA?
That would be nearly as bad as the USA trying to extradite an Australian reporter out of Britain for espionage.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2025, @01:25PM (1 child)
I think you misunderstand the intent of this law.
It isn't about creating an excuse to prosecute 'Johnny Foreigner', it's all about creating a list of 'proscribed' sites so that they can prosecute UK peons for having the temerity to bypass the government mandated restrictions to visit unmonitored, and read the hurty words, or watch the subversive videos etc. therein contained, or, horror of horrors, visit henious sites which allow them to post and exchange their subversive wee thoughts, all in a manner both anonymous and uncensored...
This is just another little nudge of the gas knob upwards towards 10 in the long term frog boiling exercise that is UK internet censorship. It might come as a bit of an unsurprise that a version of this 18+ restriction nonsense, managed at an ISP level, has been part of UK mobile phone internet access for quite some time now.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by VLM on Sunday August 31 2025, @04:19PM
The irony is this is the propaganda message to make law violators look unsavory, but so far AFAIK the law has only been used to censor media that makes the current ruling party look bad.
Imagine in the USA if the incumbent in an election could have anyone thrown in prison for not being enthusiastic enough about encouraging people to vote for the incumbent, and anything bad that happens to them is good because they live in a democracy and they voted for it. Thats pretty much how UK "subjects" live. They should have learned some lessons from 1776, but they didn't, and now they're paying the price.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday August 31 2025, @02:51PM
No, but they can arrest them should they enter the UK or in a country that is less critical about extradition requests.
Never happens! /sarc
(Score: 4, Informative) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2025, @05:52AM (5 children)
I can find nothing to support your claim that Joshua Conner Moon has been personally threatened with incarceration. Can you please provide a source for this claim. As far as I can tell Moon is not in the UK nor has he been detained.
You will be aware that Cloudflare did support KiwiFarms some years back but withdrew their cooperation. If this trial has any standing in the USA it would be necessary to prove that a USA provider is supporting the site. Have you any information regarding who is providing services to KiwiFarm now?
I agree that the UK's current understanding regarding VPNs is severely flawed. As a slight digression, France, Germany and several other EU countries are also taking action to ban KiwiFarms along with other similar sites.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday August 31 2025, @03:03PM (4 children)
So did the original post from echostorm:
Meanwhile what does your quote say?
It doesn't actually say anything since Kiwi Farms didn't decide to ban UK users out of thin air (but rather as a response to legal threats from Ofcom) and as of the time of the quote we have yet to see what Ofcom's future actions against Kiwi Farms would be.
Meanwhile we have the enabling law (Online Safety Act):
That's the "personal threat" against Joshua Connor Moon.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2025, @03:57PM
I confirmed what Moon had said, which is why I quoted the full statement, but there was nothing in the statement that threatened 'incarceration'. I asked for evidence of that claim.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2025, @04:04PM (2 children)
You are making this up. Where do you identify a "specific threat legal" to Moon. What you have quoted is a generic range of possible punishments. He might receive a £5.00 fine or the judge might find that there is no case to answer. There has been no specific threat that I have found, and the punishment is decided by a judge. It is exactly the same in US law. There can be a range of penalties. Each case is decided on its merits.
I reckon that Moon has done all that is required of him.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday August 31 2025, @09:07PM (1 child)
The only person in this thread who has used the phrase "specific threat legal" is you. But let's go to the above complaint and look at what they have to say on that:
So right there is a very specific legal threat. This was followed with a second legal threat towards Kiwi Farms after the UK ban had accidentally and temporarily lapsed following the server being taken down for maintenance.
From the story [therecord.media] in question:
They're making a lot of threats.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday September 01 2025, @12:53AM
Which they are quite entitled to do. If the UK wants to build a wall around itself it may do so. It is a stupid idea, but Ofcom is being stupid about lots of things. Asking the courts to do something doesn't mean that the courts must do it. Courts have often reached a decision that does not go in the government's favour.
All of which are business with a presence in the UK. Again, I do not see this as an over-reach.
IMHO, as long as KiwiFarms continues to block direct access from UK IP addresses then they are in compliance with the Ofcom ruling (ridiculous as it is). There will be no 'links' to the UK.