> For reasons that are unclear, the web form that the two men drew up for reporting gruesome images is designed in such a way that the system can only handle five reports an hour. That is unworkable, according to the hotline.
The link between hosting child porn and child protection is much more subject to argument. I'd suggest it is banned because enough people suspect the link to be there, not because of any certainty.
It is unfortunately common for terrible ideas to be shepherded in under the pretence of thinking about the children. There needs to be debate about costs and benefits of this stuff beyond the crystal clear parts. It isn't reasonable to just assume someone doesn't care about protecting children just because they're willing to host anything. Although in this case they are being rather disrespectful to the people who use the form and that doesn't sit well with me.
> I might care more once laws start protecting children from those in power more than used by those in power as a ploy to dismantle privacy from ordinary people.
In response to a thread comment regarding to the said hosting provider making it purposely difficult to report such matters...
Is there anything in the article indicating that child porn policies are being used to reduce ordinary people's privacy? From the article it sounds like they just want the child porn taken down, not any details about anyone.
The age of consent is 18 in Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, North Dakota, Oregon, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
It is 17 in Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Missouri, New York, and Texas.
It is 16 in the other 33 states and in the District of Columbia.
Of course some will claim that provisions exist for damages to be claimed in the event of false takedowns, but it is hard if not impossible to collect. Typically you need to provide all of your personal data to respond.
I know of some people who basically finance their niche bulletin boards via police requests - they get something in the range of 2-3 digits (€) for a information request. Get a few of these a year and your hosting costs are paid.
There's not a lot of money to be made but if it's your hobby anyways..
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2706
"...this title shall pay to the person or entity assembling or providing such information a fee for reimbursement for such costs as are reasonably necessary and which have been directly incurred in searching for, assembling, reproducing, or otherwise providing such information."
Not your lawyer. Just providing a link to an example law describing how some ISPs can profit from data requests.
I remember uploading a BF3 montage on YouTube some eons ago when it was all the rage, no copyrighted music or anything. I received a DMCA claim by some spanish tv/broadcasting company or something along those lines, totally unrelated to my content.
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The fact that DMCA claims can be issued with no human interaction and no repurcussions is beyond me. If anything, the hosting company should at least issue penalties on false claims.
> A DMCA claim (or takedown) is when a copyright holder notifies a service provider that they have infringing material on their site/service. It is also known as a “Notification of Infringement”. For example, Twitch has these guidelines for submitting DMCA claims. Essentially it boils down to send in writing who you are, who is infringing your rights, how they’re doing it, and swear under penalty of perjury that you are telling the truth.
https://blog.pretzel.rocks/lets-take-a-minute-to-talk-about-...
I mean, there is no getting around it if you want the countersuit to work and reflect poorly on the claimant, but you are agreeing to letting the U.S. have extra-territorial jurisdiction.
If penalties are issued by the hosting company, then they just won't be paid. Then you lose: there's no way to take all the non-paying offenders to court, and you can't ignore subsequent requests, so you wind up in the same situation as you're in now.
Instead, move the onus off the hosting company: if they receive from some entity a DMCA takedown that is believed to be false (according to whatever standards are applied to counterclaims), then no further takedown notices from that entity are required to be obeyed until the entity takes appropriate remedial action.
There are no standards for counterclaims except format standards. All a counterclaim does is permit undoing a takedown without the provider being liable, transferring determination of who is right to litigation between the purported copyright owner and the content uploader with the host fully immunized.
If the falsity is only in regard to the not-under-perjury parts of a takedown notice (like, say, that there is infringing content!), then you maybe, in some circumstances, have a tortious interference claim, but, generally, you are screwed. If you are lucky, your host has and follows a counternotice process and you can get the material back up, but recovering any damages is unlikely.
That reminds me a lot of the saga of Kim Dotcom
I'm sure these companies don't throwout local court summons, but a lot of copyright holders (or their agents) send out DMCA claims and don't follow through beyond that.
This is less obvious than it might appear - the US has pushed to include DMCA-equivalent claims in international trade deals.
E.g. The proposed UK-US Free Trade Agreement explicitly includes negotiation around intellectual property rights: https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/Summary_of_U.S.-UK_Nego...
a “DMCA claim" isn’t really the issue, the DMCA safe harbor (takedowns aren’t a basis for claims, but for safe harbor from claims against the provider) doesn’t apply outside of US law. To the extent another jurisdiction has provider liability, following US DMCA takedown rules won't protect you from it.
Worked for WIPO as a consultant back in the 90s.
Chucking a DMCA in the trash sounds like it's against Dutch law
On that matter though, here's what copyright.gov has to say:
"There is no such thing as an “international copyright” that will automatically protect an author’s writings throughout the world. Protection against unauthorized use in a particular country depends on the national laws of that country."
To use a claim for any purpose other than enforcing your own copyrights (since 'illegal images' is such a broad term) is illegal in of itself.
The DMCA itself has no jurisdiction outside of the US regardless of the person accessing the data is within the US.
In order to submit a DMCA claim, one has to do so under the penalty of perjury.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512
>(vi)A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
A DMCA claim isn't a "notification of illegal images." It is a statement of "I own the (copy)rights to this work and you do not have permission to host/use it."
The Dutch hosting company doesn't obey US law. My god! Can you believe these assholes? Running a hosting company that just hosts, and doesn't snoop into what their customers are doing? And how dare they make enforcement agencies actually go through the required legal processes to enforce the law!