Freedom of expression online
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The Need for a Council of Europe Recommendation on Combatting SLAPPs
104 civil society organisations call on the Council of Europe (CoE) to act urgently on the growing threat of Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs).
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Coalition of human rights and journalist organisations express concerns for free speech
On 25 March, 61 human rights and journalist organisations sent a joint letter to Members of the European Parliament, urging them to vote against the proposed Regulation on addressing the dissemination of terrorist content online.
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Delete first, think later
The proposed Digital Services Act wants to push online platforms to quickly remove illegal content. But it uses a sledgehammer on a most intricate challenge: moderating online speech. The result would crush freedom of expression instead of enabling it. This is the second blog post in a new series dedicated to the EU’s proposed Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act.
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Why Facebook’s proposed hate speech policy on Zionism would only add fuel to the fire
Pressured to combat surging hate speech and anti-Semitism on its platform, Facebook is looking into how it should moderate the use of the word “Zionist,” and whether to add the term as a protected category under its hate speech policy. EDRi's member Access Now doesn’t think that is a good idea, particularly given Facebook’s inability to strictly adhere to human rights principles in its content moderation practices.
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At a glance: Does the EU Digital Services Act protect freedom of expression?
The Digital Services Act is in many ways an ambitious piece of legislation that seeks to make ‘Big Tech’ accountable to public authorities through new significant transparency and due diligence obligations. It also contains many provisions that could help protect users’ fundamental rights. Whether it will be successful at protecting freedom of expression from undue restrictions or reining in the power of Big Tech rather than cementing it, is, however, questionable. EDRi's member ARTICLE 19 share its first thoughts on why.
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ePrivacy strikes back
“And when we woke up, the ePrivacy Regulation was still there”, could be the EU bubble version of the famous micro-tale. Four years after the main text protecting privacy and confidentiality of people in the EU was proposed, Member States have finally given the green light to finalise the adoption. But, where will this lead us?
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The Digital Markets Act must do more to protect end users’ rights
As the European Commission sets out plans for a Digital Markets Act, EDRi calls for the protection of users’ human rights to be at the centre of plans to regulate the role platform gatekeepers play in the future of Europe’s digital environment.
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#PrivacyCamp21: Event Summary
The theme of the 9th edition of Privacy Camp was "Digital rights for change: Reclaiming infrastructures, repairing the future" and included thirteen sessions on a variety of topics. The event was attended by 250 people. If you missed the event or want a reminder of what happened in the session, find the session summaries below.
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Polish law on “protecting the freedoms of social media users” will do exactly the opposite
EDRi member Panoptykon Foundation carefully analyses the Polish law on “the protection of freedoms of social media users” which turns out to introduce data retention, a new, questionable definition of “unlawful content”, and an oversight body that is likely to be politically compromised.
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EU Terrorist Content Online Regulation Could Curtail Freedom of Expression across Europe
Counter-terrorism laws that have continued to pile up in the past years in Europe have constantly eroded the rule of law and reinforced executive powers of the state to the detriment of judicial oversight.
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La Quadrature du Net asks for renewed support to challenge TERREG in France
In light of the European Parliament's vote on the Regulation to prevent the dissemination of said “terrorist content”, EDRi observer La Quadrature du Net (LQDN) sheds light on some of the most concerning provisions which have to be addressed before the final adoption of the regulation.
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Member in the Spotlight: Alternatif Bilişim Derneği
Alternatif Bilişim Derneği emphasises that technological work and algorithms have the most adverse impact on its users; thus the critical public sphere must also be created by users themselves, in a distributed, decentralised fashion. In their country, they want a political order that respects human rights and does not enforce auto-censorship on its citizens.
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