In protest against the attack on social security by the Dutch government, a group of hackers started a DDoS attack on several government sites. These sites could not be reached for several days.
5:41:45 PM comment []
"Under the European E-Commerce directive internet hosting providers risk liability for apparently illegal content from their customers. Once they are notified, they should take immediate action to block or remove the content. How serious are
providers in the Netherlands about their responsibility for the online freedom of
speech? Should providers first ask their customer to respond to an allegation, or
does 'immediate' mean they have to first shoot and ask questions later? What if the
complaint about an alleged infringement lacks legal grounds?"
The Multatuli Project (pdf): Bits of Freedom made a test and published a text by Multatuli from 1871 on sites of 10 different providers. Then a fake complaint and request to remove the pages was sent to these providers from a hotmail address. Only 3 out of the 10 providers did not remove the site. Only one of them checked and concluded that the text was free of copyright and could therefore be published.
Providers should be much more careful when they remove pages. Compared with the Safe Harbour provisions in the US, the European legislation leaves plenty of room for doubt and misguided judgement by providers.
10:30:33 AM comment []
