On Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 2:04 AM, Bob Blick wrote: > A disabled kid in Italy was being bullied and someone posted video of > him to the internet At this point we have several different conflicting ideas, and I think that people are trying to argue them all at once. First: Possible Responsible Parties ------------------------------------------ What is the responsibility of each of the following to comply with national laws: - ICANN (International organization that basically regulates the internet) - ISPs (individual companies, organizations, gov't organizations that actually run the internet) - Hosting services (companies and organizations that store content, and make it publicly available via the internet) - Clients (Individual or companies that interact with the internet by publishing or consuming most of the content) Google, in this case, is acting the part of the Hosting service. Are they responsible for the content that is located on their servers? In some countries they are seen as a media corporation, and thus they might be legally responsible for obtaining model contracts for anyone appearing in any of their videos. In other countries they might be seen as journalistic in nature, and so model contracts might not be required in some cases. In still other countries they are seen as a service (like a shopping center with bulliten boards where anyone can post a piece of paper with advertising, political posters, something funny, business cards, or whatever) and they are not responsible for the content posted, unless they are aware that it breaks the law, and if they take action in that case then they are seen as complying with the law. But in the more strict cases, it would appear that the ISPs and even ICANN might share some responsibility. After all they *could* do something about this issue at both levels, so therefore they must take some of the blame of violating privacy laws. National privacy laws ------------------------------ Here's where it gets even more sticky. Regardless of *who* is to blame, there are big differences between privacy laws in one nation vs another. In the US, a private citizen can take video of other people in a public place and show it to whomever they like with very few legal repurcussions. I understand this might not be the case elsewhere. Further, as described above, there are differences depending on who they are, and how they show it to others. If they are a company, and use it in marketing materials such as commercials, then the people have to sign modeling contracts. If they are journalists showing it on the nightly news then they may be able to do so without a contract depending on the usage of the video. If they are private citizens, showing it on a big screen in a park or privately at home, they generally don't have to have permission fromt he people appearing in the video, since it was originally taken in a public place. There are nuances to this based on "expectation of privacy", but this is the general oidea. Place of violation ------------------------ Further, does it matter where the video was recorded, where it's stored, or where it's ultimately viewed? Where does the violation actually occur? If the video is stored on a server in the US, but played in Italy using an italian ISP to carry teh video over the ocean, then can't you say that the media organization is "transmitting" it from the US, and thus Italian law has no jurisdiction, except over the local ISP? What if it's stored in the US, but Google has a completely unrelated business presence in Italy (say, for their solar power projects)? Shouldn't an Italian ISP have stopped the video from being transmitted out of the country to Google's data center? China understands the implications of this, and so requires their ISPs to be the gatekeepers to enforce their national laws. How can Italy explain that they are sentencing Americans from an American company for breaking an italian law when they never stepped foot on italian soil, and the violation (in terms of where the data is stored and played from) occurred outside the country? Now I'm not saying that's absolutely the case - I'm sure they have a data center in italy, and it's possible the video was stored there, and it's possible that the executives live and work in italy. But the arguments about the general concept must take these issues into account. Balancing Privacy, Anonymity, and Freedom of Speech ----------------------------------------------- The kid may have a right to privacy in a public place. Even in the US there are complex rules for whether someone might have the right to privacy, or an expected right to privacy even in a public place. His right to privacy should trump the video poster's right to freedom of speech and anonymity. However, this can only be done on a case-by-case basis. If someone videos a politician receiving a bribe, their right to privacy might not trump the recorder's right to anonymity (whistleblower laws might apply) or freedom of speech (hold gov't officials accountable). Therefore there is NO way to have a blanket, easy to enforce rule that covers all situations. Given that, is it reasonable to expect third parties to enforce the laws of each country without the authority to enforce the laws? Are they then responsible for reporting the violations, or are they seen as bystanders - not responsible for reporting the rape they saw if they don't wish to become involved? I suspect that given these four intersecting axis, there's no easy way to say that what was done was right or wrong without each argument being broken down so it's clear where the relevant points exist in each axis. Regardless, I distrust anyone that says without hesitation that they know this case was rightly solved or wrongly solved since no one here has all the above information as it pertains to this particular case. -Adam -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist