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EU Commission Proposes Mandatory Piracy Filters For Online Services (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: During his State of the Union address today, EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced several plans (PDF) to modernize copyright law in Europe. One of the suggestions that has a lot of people worried is Article 13, which requires online services to police pirated content. This means that online services, which deal with large volumes of user-uploaded content, must use fingerprinting and filtering mechanisms to block copyright infringing files. While the Commission stresses that small content platforms won't be subject to the requirement, the proposal doesn't define what "small" means. It also fails to define what "appropriate" or "effective" content recognition systems are, creating a fair bit of uncertainty. Commenting on the proposal, Digital rights group EDRi says that it will put many European companies at risk while endangering users' right to free speech. "The text that was launched today includes a proposal to potentially filter all uploads to the Internet in Europe. The draft text would destroy users' rights and legal certainty for European hosting companies," EDRi notes. The Commission, however, notes that the changes are needed to reinforce the negotiating position of copyright holders, so they can sign licensing agreements with services that provide access to user uploaded content.
The trouble is, Juncker seems to be just about crazy enough to actually follow through with this. If he does, it's probably going to create a lot of trouble for a lot of people and waste a lot of money before it ultimately fails.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
As much of a shitshow as the US is, I always enjoy seeing Europe flailing about in lunacy. It's what it does best. That and be at war with itself.
He has very little power.
Unfortunately, in cases like this, that's not entirely true. Commissioners, and by extension Juncker, are still where a lot of the real power in the EU lies, even if the Parliament has more power to get in the way since the Lisbon treaty. If the Commission can drive this sort of measure through via a regulation rather than a directive, it will automatically become binding in all EU member states without the national governments having to do (or ratify) anything. And as I seem to be pointing out a lot lately, the EU authorities are generally very pro-copyright at the moment, so there is no guarantee at all that the Parliament won't essentially wave through whatever the Commission proposes here.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.