Great. Google should become liable for all the illegal content that slips through, all the way to the officers and directors of the company.
I think we as the society agree that child porn and child sexual abuse is a criminally punishable offense. A platform in a possession of it clearly is in a possession and distribution of child pornography, hence officers and directors should be charged under those statues.
Isn't that why we have safe harbor laws to encourage platforms to self regulate and collaborate with law enforcement in exchange for not being sued for those violations ?
Without those provisions no website could allow user created content, as they would instantly be sued to oblivion.
If Google wants to be viewed as a safe harbor, so Google should behave as one and stop deciding what is "hateful". What you/Google/government consider hateful can be what I or the people in Belarus consider the truth. This trend of "censorship for your own good" needs to stop.
I believe all platforms do moderation of some sort. It sounds like what you are proposing is that nobody be allowed to do any moderation. How do you think that would work?
It would work as the internet is supposed to work. Like it worked about until 2015. Slander and libel is punishable under law. This is the way to punish lies and excesses. For the rest, lets just talk, freely, and let the best ideas win.
> Isn't that why we have safe harbor laws to encourage platforms to self regulate and collaborate with law enforcement in exchange for not being sued for those violations ?
> Without those provisions no website could allow user created content, as they would instantly be sued to oblivion.
I want to make it clear that I do not have a problem with a safe harbor what so ever.
If Google wants to prevent its users who ask it from being able to access some portion of internet, Google absolutely can do that. That portion of the internet should not be able to go after Google for acting on behalf of the users.
What Google is doing is preventing users that did not ask for that from being able to access that portion of the internet. It is akin to Verizon deciding "that content is bad so we are going to block it in our pipe". If Google wants to do that, then fine it is providing the "clean internet experience" and it should absolutely be punished when it fails at doing that (hosting child porn)
I think we as the society agree that child porn and child sexual abuse is a criminally punishable offense. A platform in a possession of it clearly is in a possession and distribution of child pornography, hence officers and directors should be charged under those statues.