Belgian Court Says That ISPs Must Not Pay a Copyright Levy to Collective Societies
By Giancarlo Frosio on March 30, 2015 at 5:45 am
Whether and when communications platforms like Google, Twitter and Facebook are liable for their users’ online activities is one of the key factors that affects innovation and free speech. Most creative expression today takes place over communications networks owned by private companies. Governments around the world increasingly press intermediaries to block their users’ undesirable online content in order to suppress dissent, hate speech, privacy violations and the like. One form of pressure is to make communications intermediaries legally responsible for what their users do and say. Liability regimes that put platform companies at legal risk for users’ online activity are a form of censorship-by-proxy, and thereby imperil both free expression and innovation, even as governments seek to resolve very real policy problems.
In the United States, the core doctrines of section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and section 512 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act have allowed these online intermediary platforms user generated content to flourish. But, immunities and safe harbors for intermediaries are under threat in the U.S. and globally as governments seek to deputize intermediaries to assist in law enforcement.
To contribute to this important policy debate, CIS studies international approaches to intermediary obligations concerning users’ copyright infringement, defamation, hate speech or other vicarious liabilities, immunities, or safe harbors; publishes a repository of information on international liability regimes and works with global platforms and free expression groups to advocate for policies that will protect innovation, freedom of expression, privacy and other user rights.
By Giancarlo Frosio on March 30, 2015 at 5:45 am
By Giancarlo Frosio on March 27, 2015 at 12:04 pm
Recently, the Supreme Court of India issued a landmark decision regarding the constitutionality of several provisions included in the Indian Information Technology Act ("IT Act"). The provisions dealt with content removal online and blocking orders. According to the Supreme Court, vague standards for blocking and removing content online are unconstitutional. Additionally, content blocking must be mandated only by a reasoned order from a judicial, administrative or governmental body and must be transparent. Read more about Landmark Intermediary Liability Decision from the Indian Supreme Court
By Giancarlo Frosio on March 27, 2015 at 4:20 am
A few days ago, digital rights advocates and civil society groups gathered together in Manila and approved the Intermediary Liability Principles. The principles were officially launched at the Rightscon Southeast Asia in Manila. Read more about Welcome to the Manila Intermediary Liability Principles!
By Beth Van Schaack on March 24, 2015 at 5:15 am
This is Part I of a series on a case pending in the Northern District of California against Cisco Systems involving the company's provision of technology to help construct, operate and maintain China's Golden Shield, a network surveillance system that was allegedly used to target Falun Gong practitioners for persecution. Part I outlines the claims in and procedural posture of the case; Part II discuses some of the legal issues in play with reference to other cases of corporate complicity in human rights abuses under the Alien Tort Statute. Read more about China’s Golden Shield: Is Cisco Systems Complicit?