Germany To Limit Freedom of Expression With up to €50 Million Fines - Like This Article

April 6th, 2017 - Fort Russ News -

- Agencies - - by Samer Hussein -

       

Social networking sites could face up to €50 Million fines, should they fail to remove the “fake news”, “hate speech”, libel and defamatory content.

At least that could happen if the new German bill will be introduced.

The reason for the sudden controversial move which would further strengthen the already strict defamatory laws, was allegedly a selfie of a Syrian migrant Anas Modamani with the German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The particular photo from 2015 is known to be widely used by various political groups, opposed to immigration and was often displayed in the wake of terror attacks that devastated Germany over the past 2 years.

The social networking site Facebook, where the photo had the widest circulation, was even take into court after “failing to remove the hate posts, attributed to the photo in a reasonable time” as well as for not having their terms and conditions up to the standards due to not including libel, which is considered a criminal offense in Germany. Facebook has won the court case since. 

The move of the Merkel cabinet is highly dangerous as the new bill could be used in a way that could seriously violate the people's right to freedom of expression and might negatively affect the already limited transparency of the German press.

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from Fort Russ http://ift.tt/2nPJxz6
Germany To Limit Freedom of Expression With up to €50 Million Fines - Like This Article

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