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#section230

22 posts14 participants3 posts today
Public
Miguel Afonso Caetano

"Once again, several Senators appear poised to gut one of the most important laws protecting internet users - Section 230 (47 U.S.C. § 230).

Don’t be fooled - many of Section 230’s detractors claim that this critical law only protects big tech. The reality is that Section 230 provides limited protection for all platforms, though the biggest beneficiaries are small platforms and users. Why else would some of the biggest platforms be willing to endorse a bill that guts the law? In fact, repealing Section 230 would only cement the status of Big Tech monopolies.

As EFF has said for years, Section 230 is essential to protecting individuals’ ability to speak, organize, and create online.

Congress knew exactly what Section 230 would do – that it would lay the groundwork for speech of all kinds across the internet, on websites both small and large. And that’s exactly what has happened.

Section 230 isn’t in conflict with American values. It upholds them in the digital world. People are able to find and create their own communities, and moderate them as they see fit. People and companies are responsible for their own speech, but (with narrow exceptions) not the speech of others."

eff.org/deeplinks/2025/03/230-

Electronic Frontier Foundation · 230 Protects Users, Not Big TechOnce again, several Senators appear poised to gut one of the most important laws protecting internet users - Section 230 (47 U.S.C. § 230). Don’t be fooled - many of Section 230’s detractors claim that this critical law only protects big tech. The reality is that Section 230 provides limited...
#USA#Section230#CommunicationsDecencyAct
Replied in thread
Public
Strypey

(1/?)

@norightturnnz
> Will Labour take on the oligarchs?

I very much hope so, but David Parker is dead wrong when he says;

"... we in the west have made a fundamental error in providing what is in effect an exclusion of liability for third party content."

I suggest reading some of the pieces Mike Masnick has published in defence of #Section230, the US equivalent of the limited liability for third-party content that Parker proposes to abolish;

techdirt.com/tag/section-230/

Techdirtsection 230 – TechdirtPosts about section 230 written by Mike Masnick, jmiers230, Leigh Beadon, and Cathy Gellis
#TechRegulation
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william.maggos

#OtherwiseObjectionable is all good but this episode is essential.

Before #Section230, an online space could choose not to moderate and then remain free of responsibility for anything, or try to moderate and become responsible for all the shit they couldn't keep up with. That would create an internet only trolls would want to use (jerk fedi?) or where mega corps ruled.

The law found a middle-ground by making posters not hosts responsible while encouraging moderation.

pca.st/f8w1vucq

Pocket CastsEpisode 3: Law and Disorder - Otherwise ObjectionableThe true story of the most misunderstood law on the internet. Tech journalist Mike Masnick brings you inside the making of Section 230 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, featuring witnesses to Silicon Valley’s Wild West era, the Congressmen who wrote the law, and innovators who benefited from its balance of freedom and responsibility. Why do so many people hate this law, how does the rest of the world deal with these issues, and how can it be used to take on new challenges like A.I.? Listen to find out.Otherwise Objectionable is executive produced by Bilander Media.
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Dag

I've often criticized #section230 that shields online providers from liability of content published on their platforms. Removing Section 230 in the current political climate could be even worse. Section 230 makes it hard for any government or person to contest hate speech on any online platform, but I wonder what will happen without this
techdirt.com/2025/03/25/how-de
#SoMe #SocialMedia

Techdirt · How Democrats’ Attack On Section 230 Plays Right Into Trump’s Censorial PlansLike clockwork, lawmakers are once again rallying around the idea of eliminating Section 230. That Republicans are leading this charge is hardly surprising—repealing Section 230 is explicitly laid …
Public
James House-Lantto (He/Him)

eff.org/deeplinks/2025/03/230-

This article by the #EFF argues against the misconception that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act only protects big tech companies.

Instead, it maintains that Section 230 benefits all platforms, including small ones and individual users, by protecting them from being held liable for content created by others.

Electronic Frontier Foundation · 230 Protects Users, Not Big TechOnce again, several Senators appear poised to gut one of the most important laws protecting internet users - Section 230 (47 U.S.C. § 230). Don’t be fooled - many of Section 230’s detractors claim that this critical law only protects big tech. The reality is that Section 230 provides limited...
#Section230#CivilRights#CivilLiberties
Public
MusiqueNow :pride: ✡️ 🇵🇸 :anarchismhebrew:

#EFF #ElectronicFrontierFoundation :

#Section230

eff.org/issues/cda230

eff.org/deeplinks/2023/02/sect

eff.org/deeplinks/2025/03/230-

230 Protects Users, Not #BigTech
by #IndiaMcKinney

24 march 2025

Electronic Frontier FoundationSection 23047 U.S.C. § 230 The Internet allows people everywhere to connect, share ideas, and advocate for change without needing immense resources or technical expertise. Our unprecedented ability to communicate online—on blogs, social media platforms, and educational and cultural platforms like Wikipedia and the Internet Archive—is not an accident. Congress recognized that for user speech to thrive on the Internet, it had to protect the services that power users’ speech.  That’s why the U.S. Congress passed a law, Section 230 (originally part of the Communications Decency Act), that protects Americans’ freedom of expression online by protecting the intermediaries we all rely on. It states:  "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." (47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1)). Section 230 embodies that principle that we should all be responsible for our own actions and statements online, but generally not those of others. The law prevents most civil suits against users or services that are based on what others say.  Congress passed this bipartisan legislation because it recognized that promoting more user speech online outweighed potential harms. When harmful speech takes place, it’s the speaker that should be held responsible, not the service that hosts the speech.  Section 230’s protections are not absolute. It does not protect companies that violate federal criminal law. It does not protect companies that create illegal or harmful content. Nor does Section 230 protect companies from intellectual property claims.  Section 230 Protects Us All  For more than 25 years, Section 230 has protected us all: small blogs and websites, big platforms, and individual users.  The free and open internet as we know it couldn’t exist without Section 230. Important court rulings on Section 230 have held that users and services cannot be sued for forwarding email, hosting online reviews, or sharing photos or videos that others find objectionable. It also helps to quickly resolve lawsuits cases that have no legal basis.  Congress knew that the sheer volume of the growing Internet would make it impossible for services to review every users’ speech. When Section 230 was passed in 1996, about 40 million people used the Internet worldwide. By 2019, more than 4 billion people were online, with 3.5 billion of them using social media platforms. In 1996, there were fewer than 300,000 websites; by 2017, there were more than 1.7 billion.  Without Section 230’s protections, many online intermediaries would intensively filter and censor user speech, while others may simply not host user content at all. This legal and policy framework allows countless niche websites, as well as big platforms like Amazon and Yelp to host user reviews. It allows users to share photos and videos on big platforms like Facebook and on the smallest blogs. It allows users to share speech and opinions everywhere, from vast conversational forums like Twitter and Discord, to the comment sections of the smallest newspapers and blogs.  Content Moderation For All Tastes  Congress wanted to encourage internet users and services to create and find communities. Section 230’s text explains how Congress wanted to protect the internet’s unique ability to provide “true diversity of political discourse” and “opportunities for cultural development, and… intellectual activity.”  Diverse communities have flourished online, providing us with “political, educational, cultural, and entertainment services.” Users, meanwhile, have new ways to control the content they see.  Section 230 allows for web operators, large and small, to moderate user speech and content as they see fit. This reinforces the First Amendment’s protections for publishers to decide what content they will distribute. Different approaches to moderating users’ speech allows users to find the places online that they like, and avoid places they don’t.  Without Section 230, the Internet is different. In Canada and Australia, courts have allowed operators of online discussion groups to be punished for things their users have said. That has reduced the amount of user speech online, particularly on controversial subjects. In non-democratic countries, governments can directly censor the internet, controlling the speech of platforms and users.  If the law makes us liable for the speech of others, the biggest platforms would likely become locked-down and heavily censored. The next great websites and apps won’t even get started, because they’ll face overwhelming legal risk to host users’ speech.  Learn More About Section 230 Most Important Section 230 Legal Cases Section 230 is Good, Actually How Congress Censored the Internet With SESTA/FOSTA Here's an infographic we made in 2012 about the importance of Section 230. 
#Tech#FascistUSA#UnitedStatesOfBATSHIT
Public
AI6YR Ben

Hmm, not a lawyer, but if Section 230 goes, someone not in the US is going to have to host my users.

eff.org/issues/cda230

Electronic Frontier FoundationSection 23047 U.S.C. § 230 The Internet allows people everywhere to connect, share ideas, and advocate for change without needing immense resources or technical expertise. Our unprecedented ability to communicate online—on blogs, social media platforms, and educational and cultural platforms like Wikipedia and the Internet Archive—is not an accident. Congress recognized that for user speech to thrive on the Internet, it had to protect the services that power users’ speech.  That’s why the U.S. Congress passed a law, Section 230 (originally part of the Communications Decency Act), that protects Americans’ freedom of expression online by protecting the intermediaries we all rely on. It states:  "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." (47 U.S.C. § 230(c)(1)). Section 230 embodies that principle that we should all be responsible for our own actions and statements online, but generally not those of others. The law prevents most civil suits against users or services that are based on what others say.  Congress passed this bipartisan legislation because it recognized that promoting more user speech online outweighed potential harms. When harmful speech takes place, it’s the speaker that should be held responsible, not the service that hosts the speech.  Section 230’s protections are not absolute. It does not protect companies that violate federal criminal law. It does not protect companies that create illegal or harmful content. Nor does Section 230 protect companies from intellectual property claims.  Section 230 Protects Us All  For more than 25 years, Section 230 has protected us all: small blogs and websites, big platforms, and individual users.  The free and open internet as we know it couldn’t exist without Section 230. Important court rulings on Section 230 have held that users and services cannot be sued for forwarding email, hosting online reviews, or sharing photos or videos that others find objectionable. It also helps to quickly resolve lawsuits cases that have no legal basis.  Congress knew that the sheer volume of the growing Internet would make it impossible for services to review every users’ speech. When Section 230 was passed in 1996, about 40 million people used the Internet worldwide. By 2019, more than 4 billion people were online, with 3.5 billion of them using social media platforms. In 1996, there were fewer than 300,000 websites; by 2017, there were more than 1.7 billion.  Without Section 230’s protections, many online intermediaries would intensively filter and censor user speech, while others may simply not host user content at all. This legal and policy framework allows countless niche websites, as well as big platforms like Amazon and Yelp to host user reviews. It allows users to share photos and videos on big platforms like Facebook and on the smallest blogs. It allows users to share speech and opinions everywhere, from vast conversational forums like Twitter and Discord, to the comment sections of the smallest newspapers and blogs.  Content Moderation For All Tastes  Congress wanted to encourage internet users and services to create and find communities. Section 230’s text explains how Congress wanted to protect the internet’s unique ability to provide “true diversity of political discourse” and “opportunities for cultural development, and… intellectual activity.”  Diverse communities have flourished online, providing us with “political, educational, cultural, and entertainment services.” Users, meanwhile, have new ways to control the content they see.  Section 230 allows for web operators, large and small, to moderate user speech and content as they see fit. This reinforces the First Amendment’s protections for publishers to decide what content they will distribute. Different approaches to moderating users’ speech allows users to find the places online that they like, and avoid places they don’t.  Without Section 230, the Internet is different. In Canada and Australia, courts have allowed operators of online discussion groups to be punished for things their users have said. That has reduced the amount of user speech online, particularly on controversial subjects. In non-democratic countries, governments can directly censor the internet, controlling the speech of platforms and users.  If the law makes us liable for the speech of others, the biggest platforms would likely become locked-down and heavily censored. The next great websites and apps won’t even get started, because they’ll face overwhelming legal risk to host users’ speech.  Learn More About Section 230 Most Important Section 230 Legal Cases Section 230 is Good, Actually How Congress Censored the Internet With SESTA/FOSTA Here's an infographic we made in 2012 about the importance of Section 230. 
#Politics#USpol#Section230
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william.maggos

AFAICT #Section230 defaults the internet to small, independent websites letting people post dumb shit. And that's great cause sometimes that stuff isn't actually dumb, it was just unlikely to be thought of or said, especially by the wealthy/powerful. It was low-key genius.

Without it, everybody would need to be a lot more careful. Kinda like what we see with overly cautious moderation here on this social network of small, independent websites. IMHO

#fediblockmeta#LiberalValues#SocialWeb
Replied in thread
Public
janggolan

Re #section230 : : "The dumbest part of this is that while these Senators will likely claim they are doing this to punish 'big tech,' this would actually strengthen Meta and Google’s dominance. While smaller sites shut down rather than risk bankruptcy from legal fees, Meta or Google can easily absorb those same costs. It’s as if these Senators looked at the internet’s consolidation problem and decided the solution was… more consolidation."

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