
New EU law prescribes website blocking in the name of consumer protection - cameronhowe
https://juliareda.eu/2017/11/eu-website-blocking/
======
sassenach
I think this is the relevant paragraph in the document (page 27 in
[http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/commissions/imco/inag/...](http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/commissions/imco/inag/2017/07-11/IMCO_AG\(2017\)608048_EN.pdf))
linked from the article:

"3\. Competent authorities shall have at least the following enforcement
powers:

(e) where no other effective means are available to bring about the cessation
or the prohibition of the infringement including by requesting a third party
or other public authority to implement such measures, in order to prevent the
risk of serious harm to the collective interests of consumers:

\- to remove content or restrict access to an online interface or to order the
explicit display of a warning to consumers when accessing the online
interface;

\- to order a hosting service provider to remove, disable or restrict the
access to an online interface; or

\- where appropriate, order domain registries or registrars to delete a fully
qualified domain name and allow the competent authority concerned to register
it;"

Seems similar to already existing measures against infringement of copyrights,
except that thing about circumventing the courts, as Reda writes. Could this
possibly mean websites such as Facebook could be blocked on the grounds of
protecting consumers? The document defines 'widespread infringement' as

"(1) any act or omission contrary to Union laws that protect consumers'
interests that harmed, harms, or is likely to harm the collective interests of
consumers"

~~~
mattmanser
"risk of serious harm to the collective interests of consumers"

What a weaselly term. Bet they spent months trying to come up with something
that didn't sound ridiculously biased/anti-consumer and that's the best they
came up with. So obviously corrupt.

~~~
eksemplar
Do you have any evidence to support your claims of corruption or are you just
loud mouthing based on what you feel is true?

I ask because the EU already has the ability to block sites infringe on
copyrights.

To me this law is one of the reactions taken to the fact that foreign powers
are using completely faked news papers and social media pages to influence out
elections.

Right now consumers have very little ammunition against companies like
Facebook. In the EU we have the right to everything they’ve gathered on us and
to demand they delete it, but if they went full retard we couldn’t legally
block them.

Now we can.

~~~
arghwhat
As a European, I find _both_ the ability to force others to not distribute
information, _and_ the ability for others to restrict my access certain types
of sites to be a disgusting violation of free speech. I would expect this in a
certain country in Asia, not in bloody Europe. Not only does it violate free
speech, the new ability to perform website takedowns bypass proper law and
order, by not leaving any ability to defend oneself in a proper court of law.
A copyright infringement claim may be false, for example.

The ability to block content country-wide won't help reduce misinformation,
which will always have ways to spread. What are we going to do, make it
illegal to be _uneducated_ , have _unpopular opinions_ or be a _bad person_?
Instead, this new power can easily be abused to stop the spread of real
information, and unpopular (for example, government-opposing or religious)
opinions.

The original ability to delete information is absurd in a similar way, but
more limited, as only the subject can request it. Yet it still bypasses a
proper trial, leaving it up to you and the service provider to conclude if the
information was useful to the "general public". That's _definitely_ going to
result in deletion of valuable information.

If you want to give people a way to defend themselves against harmful
information, give them the right to amend it instead. Deleting it is _wrong_.
If you want to avoid fake news like you state, educate. Controlling people by
removing information is _wrong_.

~~~
zaarn
>Not only does it violate free speech, the new ability to perform website
takedowns bypass proper law and order, by not leaving any ability to defend
oneself in a proper court of law.

The law explicitly states itself to be a last measure when a court of law is
not an option (ie, overseas or anonymous parties)

It is a last resort by consumer protection agencies when they can't use a
court or the other party is unwilling to cooperate with their jurisdiction.
That is not equivalent to "bypass proper law and order". It's enforcing it.
That is the job of the CPA's.

>disgusting violation of free speech.

Yes but in some parts of Europe there is no Free Speech. Germany for example
has Free Opinions, which is a narrower field of speech.

------
dalbasal
This feels like a fight we're going to lose eventually.

Proposals come up.. most fail. I admire those responsible for putting up
resistance. But.. some succeed. Others partially succeed. Limited to stopping
pedophilia, piracy, nazis... Those are bridgeheads.

The direction is monodirectional. Eighty six proposals can fail, but if the
eighty seventh succeeds that's just as good. There is no going back. Win,
good. Lose, try again. That kind of dynamic guarantees a certain result.

~~~
pilsetnieks
> The direction is monodirectional

The obvious tautology aside, I wouldn't agree with this in case of the EU (the
US, probably.) To me, the EU feels more like two steps forward, one step back
- this being the step back but, for example, the GDPR being the two steps (or
leaps) forward.

In any case, this regulation seems more misguided rather than malicious. It's
targeting real problems that have to be tackled but it does have the fault of
granting overly broad powers to the respective institutions.

~~~
StanislavPetrov
>In any case, this regulation seems more misguided rather than malicious.

Intent isn't relevant at all - only result.

~~~
jopsen
And relevant in how it'll be interpreted by the courts.

~~~
StanislavPetrov
Which is a statement about the worthlessness of the legal system and not the
worth of the legislation.

~~~
jopsen
explain please?

------
seomint
Whenever I see news like this I think of John Gilmore's quote, "The Net
interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." Perhaps decisions like
this will hasten a move toward a decentralized and an encrypted Net where
politicians and their corporate sponsors have far less influence.

~~~
noir_lord
Maybe but as long as they leave the mainstream porn sites alone I don't think
it'll speed it up that much.

------
Kequc
This has been going on for a while but all the way down to the web host it
seems like companies are on board with this stuff. I've found that terms of
service for web hosting companies generally includes a clause that specifies
one of your users harassing another one of your users.

As if you can prevent that as a website owner. Especially since such a thing
would be totally subjective to judge. What it means is they are purposefully
giving themselves any reason at all to shut off your site.

I asked one of them about it, I got directed to their legal department. I
asked the legal department about the clause and they told me to look for
hosting elsewhere given what they assumed was the way in which I conduct
myself on the internet.

There is no legal reason. They just want to control information.

------
zyztem
You people definetly should fight this.

We had something like this under "ban pedo" umbrella, now this thing filter
anything that is against the party rule

~~~
jopsen
> now this thing filter anything that is against the party rule

Explain, did you read the text?

------
amelius
I'm against this ... unless they block Facebook :)

~~~
kakarot
I realize you are joking to some extent, but if we are to demand net
neutrality, we must be willing to enforce it even against our own motives.
Facebook as a website shouldn't be treated any different than any other
website. Of course we can legally attack Facebook from other angles like its
nefarious business practices.

------
gioele
The sad truth (and missing detail) is that most EU countries already have
national laws that allow extra-judicial bodies request ISPs to block websites
at the DNS/IP level with minimal oversight.

A DB of such requests, limited to Italy:
[https://censura.bofh.it/](https://censura.bofh.it/)

------
dingo_bat
We must realise that there is nothing like "rights". There is only what we can
secure for ourself, by way of voting or by way of revolution. You must fight
for your rights, always. The moment people start thinking that their rights
are inalienable, government starts eroding them.

------
choward
Man am I naive. I read the title as the EU wanting to provide a way to block
web sites that do things like track consumers.

~~~
zaarn
Technically that could be a fallout.

With the upcoming ePrivacy/GDPR in the EU, if you as a consumer sent a DNT
header or disagree with being tracked, you can notify anyone doing so and they
are under EU law required to delete your data and/or stop tracking you.

If they don't... well the nearest consumer protection office will be
interested and they'll probably then follow up with blocking the website EU
wide.

So in conclusion; yes this can be used against anyone who tracks you on the
internet against your will since the EU law will make that illegal in the
future and this law is a broadside against anyone trying to ignore EU law.

------
maxsavin
This is horrible

------
yason
I tend to agree: "There is something bigger brewing here. Something much
bigger. This is one to keep on the radar."

[https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2017/11/european-...](https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2017/11/european-
union-just-decided-to-block-websites-without-due-process-for-consumer-
protection/)

------
hw
This is great. Companies will now have to deal with this, along with the
General Data Protection Regulation (which is a huge fine if in non-compliance)

It's a lot of friction and hoops to go through, especially for smaller
companies, to do business that reaches into the EU (directly or indirectly)
with these regulations.

------
emptyfile
Consumer protection is a bad thing?

~~~
neximo64
Only if it actually protects consumers instead of national interests.

In the EU 'consumer protection' is the guise of protecting suppliers. For
example, protecting consumers from Buffalo Mozzarella means that only 4
regions of Italy may produce it (via the Protected designation of origin
scheme) (it doesn't matter if the recipe/methods are correct). This way the
consumer is 'protected' from being sold Buffalo Mozzarella from regions that
can produce it cheaper.

This method seems to be a way to force compliance online. The EU is great but
their digital initiatives are always examples of overreach. Last time it was
those ridiculous cookie notices you see on websites notifying you that the
website uses cookies.

~~~
germanier
Anybody anywhere can produce Buffalo Mozzarella. The protected term in the EU
is "Mozzarella di Bufala Campana" which has the region already in it's name.
The scheme has been introduced as trademarks protection of such terms that
often have been associated with a specific region for centuries is not
possible. It's really no different than regular trademarks for modern brands.
Historically those schemes were introduced over a hundred years ago after
faked products misled consumers. It's also a weaker interference in the free
market than copyright protection: Anybody can start producing Mozzarella di
Bufala Campana in the region while the rights to Kraft Cheese belong to a
single company.

Producing a product the cheapest way possible is not the end goal. If those
cheap products drive the traditional way out of the market (as consumers have
no reliable way of distinguishing products) consumers that specifically want
the product from that region are harmed. All others can buy generic Buffalo
Mozzarella produced anywhere just fine.

~~~
germanier
"than copyright protection" should read "than trademark protection", sorry.

------
Feniks
"website blocking infrastructure"

Uhm we've had that for a long time, it is how sites with CP and other illegal
things are dealt with.

------
pimmen
So this is how democracy dies.

------
golemotron
I read "prescribes" in the title as "proscribes." There's an argument for that
too.

------
porfirium
>To give a recent example, independence-related websites were blocked in
Catalunya just weeks ago.

That required judicial authorisation. Good way of beginning a post, with a
lie.

~~~
eugeniub
I don't see how the fact that it required judicial authorization contradicts
what the author said. Many abuses happen with the full backing of courts.

~~~
porfirium
We should abolish prisons then? It's a ridiculous argument. Abuses can happen
with full backing of the courts, but I expect them to not happen.

In all the years that this system has been in place in Spain I have never seen
it used for anything other than blocking websites that were in breach of the
law.

~~~
sverige
Wait, what? How do you get abolishing prisons out of that?

Back to the subject, what if a law is bad, but the mere act of saying publicly
that the law is bad is, in itself, breaking the law? That's where this is all
heading.

It starts with prohibiting the utterance of specific words because they hurt
someone's feelings, but hidden under "consumer safety" or "public order." No
one speaks against it because "of course we shouldn't hurt the feelings of
others with mean words."

~~~
porfirium
So what? We have hate speech laws in Europe. Try saying "the holocaust never
happened" or "homosexuals are vile creatures" and you will see what can happen
to you. There's no free speech in Europe anyway.

------
maxsavin
This can be used to shut down services like Bitcoin, can't it?

------
ucarion
I don't see the relevance of Ms Reda's example of Catalonian domains being
taken down. Using such an example seems more like a scare tactic than anything
else.

The EU law she discusses seems clearly focused on (e-)commerce, and it
instructs the government to have websites taken down only when that's the only
way to protect consumers from being harmed (e.g. defrauded) by those websites.

News websites, even those encouraging people to show up to illegal referenda,
don't appear to be affected by this law?

~~~
smsm42
The relevance is direct - while the argument may be about some specific case,
the power given does not have any limitations to this case, except vague
requirement to serve "collective interest" of consumers, whatever that could
be. It also builds the legal framework for extrajudicial control over the
content on the Internet, which means the government may now control speech in
order to serve "collective interest" of the consumers, which will inevitably
be defined by the government itself, in a self-serving manner. This opens wide
potential for abuse, and a stepping stone for implementing other extra-
judicial limits on speech - if it's ok to protect consumer from fake watches,
why not from fake news? Why not from "bad" viewpoints and "harmful"
information? Thus the government gets full control over the online speech, for
your own good, of course.

An example of how that happens and why it is dangerous is the Catalan domains
story. The Spanish government is obviously trying to limit speech which is not
in its interests.

