Page 115 - Law and the Media

Law and the Media
information and content transmitted and stored on their systems, although they will be
required to remove unlawful material from their sites if it is brought to their attention.

Racial hatred
It is an offence to incite racial hatred under the Public Order Act 1986. This applies to any
material published in new media form.

Internet service providers have been targeted by enforcement agencies and action groups in
relation to racial hatred. In 2000, an anti-racism group in Paris sought an injunction in a
French court against Yahoo! prohibiting Internet users in France from accessing a web site
hosted by Yahoo! that auctioned Nazi memorabilia. Although the site was not available on
Yahoo!’s French-language portal Yahoo.fr, it was available on Yahoo.com, which is based in
the United States but easily accessible to Internet users in France. Yahoo! defended the
proceedings on the grounds that the Yahoo.com service is governed by United States law and,
as a result, auctions of Nazi material could not be prevented because of the constitutional
right to freedom of speech in the United States.

The French court held that Yahoo! had to respect French laws prohibiting the exhibit or sale
of objects that incite racial hatred. It granted the injunction. Yahoo! issued proceedings in the
United States, inviting the court to consider whether foreign countries have jurisdiction over
the domestic activities of United States companies and material published on American web
sites. In 2001, a United States judge ruled that he could hear the case. On 7 November 2001,
a District Judge in California held that the First Amendment right to freedom of speech was
the dominant legal consideration and ruled that the order made by the French court was
inconsistent with United States law. However, the anti-racism group has appealed the
judgment, which will have a considerable impact on the issue of foreign jurisdiction over
unlawful material on the Internet.

Yahoo! was not prepared to become involved in a similar situation in England. In 2001,
following several complaints, it closed down an English web site that advocated racism on
the basis that the web site was ‘inappropriate’.

Council of Europe
The Council of Europe has drawn up a convention on cyber-crime which was adopted on 8
November 2001 and is likely to become law within the next two years.

The convention will be the first international treaty on cyber-crime. It aims to provide co-
ordinated laws on the possession of obscene material as well as ‘hacking’, the illegal
interception of data and computer-related fraud and forgery. It will also regulate in relation
to police investigations and enforcement in cases that cross international borders. Non-
member states, including Japan and the United States, have been invited to become involved
with the convention.
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