Law Avia : Hope that the constitutional Council will censor this text and badly put together

Le Figaro

proposed act against hate on the internet" was already a debate in march 2019. The finalised version of the text was adopted on 13 may, just at the exit of a two-month confinement. In spring a law with sanctions for a non-standard. As of may 18, the constitutional Council has been seized and its opinion is very much anticipated because many believe that this new law impinges heavily on the freedom of expression and will potentially generalize to a form of censorship.

read also : Mathieu Bock-Côté: "The law Avia, a law néosoviétique"

A first part of the law aimed at the prevention : it requires, therefore, the main actors of the net (especially social networks) to put in place a policy for the fight against hatred (with buttons to report the objectionable material, which is already massive) and training in "responsible use" of the networks. In parallel, an observatory of the hate speech online will be created to track these questions.

Since 2004, and the law "for confidence in the digital economy", the actors of the web are already invited to remove promptly any content that is hateful, illegal or problematic (without mandatory deadline) at least to hire their own responsibility. 16 years later, the law Avia brings a punitive aspect to be very heavy, if the law passes the constitutional Council, should be effective in a record time. That is, as from July 1, 2020 (a period of implementation that doubt after the experience with the RGPD). A decree would be expected to determine a threshold (of attendance ? of publication ? turnover ?) of web sites affected by the time limits and sanctions. Clearly, are in the line of sight of the giants of the web and social networks like Facebook and Twitter... but can also be Google (which would potentially limit the lift of the search engine).

Moderators against judges

Thus, as early as July 2, if a user or users believe that content is "clearly illegal", they must report it to the site hosting this content : it will be, then, 24 hours to remove it (1 hour for the content of terrorism, or child pornography) at the risk of incurring a fine of up to € 1.25 million. In the case of non-respect of the "duty to retreat" of the content in the allotted time, hosts and/or providers of access to internet will suspend access to the site. To limit the lift to be abusive, a prison sentence of one year and a fine of € 15,000 may be imposed.

Who will determine the illicit character of the content ? While a complaint for slander, incitement to hatred or discrimination will be dealt with by the justice system over many months, on the internet, the moderators of the giants of the web will have just 24 hours to "try" content. The all-knowing, for Facebook, for example, that 27 million French people connect each day on the network, face to face, 15.000 moderators much less trained as judges (in the United States, the training for becoming a moderator, lasts 4 weeks). If the law provides for the existence of a prosecutor and of a court of specialized, time limits on their creation and their role are not very clear.

read also : the editorial in The Figaro Magazine: "In the name of freedom"

The risk ? That the web sites are based on algorithms for sort, in a timely manner, the mass of notifications about the content issues : roughly speaking, this is already what is done and today, the deletions are relatively rare... But in the face of very heavy penalties, and a very short time, they are likely to become the norm is the slightest doubt, or from a certain level of notifications. The beginning of censorship is the systematic according of keywords because a device is poorly thought out and too automatic?

The constitutional Council has not yet issued its opinion. Hopefully he will censor this law is badly conceived, which raises the question.

Le Figaro

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" see also - Hate online: understanding the controversy over the law Avia