April 2017
Angela Merkels government are working on a bill that will fine social media platforms up to 50 milion euro if they don’t remove “fake news”.
INTERNET CENSORSHIP. Angela Merkels government are working to get a bill passed that will fine social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter up to 50 million euro if they don’t remove content that is considered to be “fake news”.
Justice Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) says:
– The providers of social networks are responsible when their platforms are misused to propagate hate crimes and fake news. The companies must organize their complaints management in a way that allows obviously criminal content to be deleted promptly. The companies will have 24 hours to remove hate speech and fake news posts that breach German law after they are flagged by users. Other illegal content needs to be deleted within seven days of reporting. Social networks are already required to remove illegal content from their websites as soon as they are aware of it, according to German law. The new fines are there to make sure they comply with the law.
Facebook in Germany says:
– This legislation would force private companies, rather than the courts, to become the judges of what is illegal in Germany.
REMOVE CONTENT WITHIN 24 HOURS
IT-giants like Facebook, Twitter, Google etc have already made a promise in 2015 to remove content within 24 hours that is racist, violent or illegal. In 2015 IT-platforms like Facebook and Twitter have signed a code of conduct where they pledged to delete hate speech within 24 hours. Heiko Maas isn’t satisfied with what the tech-companies have done so far regarding deleting content:
-Our problem is that too few pieces of criminal content are deleted by the social networks.
Maas said that according to a research Facebook only deletes about 39 percent of reported criminal content. Maas wants the bill to became law before the general election in september 2017. Heiko Maas also wants to implement a similar law on an European level.
Reference
Al Jazeera: German government banning fake news
