Censor Watch

The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) has announced human rights and digital policy expert Andrew Puddephatt as the charity's new Independent Chair.

The announcement comes as the tenure of Sir Richard Tilt, the IWF's current Chair, comes to an end after six years at the end of December.

Puddephatt played a key role in the implementation of the UK's Human Rights Act, and has been active in the promotion of human rights globally in Africa, Latin America and South and South-East Asia for more than twenty years.

Puddephatt is now looking to use his skills to protect children from sexual abuse at a time when public and political debate around the internet is becoming, according to Puddephatt, increasingly dystopian.

Susie Hargreaves IWF CEO, said:

I can't thank Sir Richard enough for the six years of dedication he's given the IWF, in the time he's been here the organisation has doubled in size, as has its turnover, and we are helping more child sexual abuse victims than ever before.

While I am saddened to see Sir Richard step down as Chair, I'm delighted to welcome Andrew to the position. Andrew's extensive experience in both digital policy and human rights makes him the perfect person for the job. We're very excited to see where Andrew will take the organisation in his time as Chair and I very much look forward to working with him in the new year.

The New Zealand media censors at the Office or Film and Literature Classification have just released their annual report. It includes the interesting observation that its 'banned' category is the most common category used in the year under review:

The most common classification in the last financial year was objectionable, meaning banned. This is a result of a large increase in material being submitted by enforcement agencies. This has coincided with a decrease in commercial submissions.

Along with films, DVD/Blu-rays and games, the Classification Office classifies a variety of material, including computer files submitted by enforcement agencies like Customs, Police, and the Department of Internal Affairs. In fact computer files make up the great majority of material banned by the Classification Office. Most of these publications were banned for promoting or supporting the sexual exploitation of children and young people.

Apart from that the New Zealand again has a knock at the government for not giving the censors remit over content streamed online:

It is now more important than ever that New Zealanders have the tools and information to allow everyone to take advantage of the freedom and opportunity the digital revolution represents -- while being smart about managing the downsides.

Regulation is lagging behind -- our system does not recognise the changes in the way New Zealanders now consume media. New Zealanders have increasingly borne the consequences of a confusing and out of date approach. The evidence is mounting about the impacts of consuming violent and graphic media, and technology keeps raising the stakes -- virtual reality and immersive media are now making an impact.

New Zealand was clearly a little embarrassed over the banning of book for young people. Ted Dawe's award-winning novel Into the River , when campaigners called for a review of the book's age classification.

When an interim restriction order was issued in 2015 an anomaly in the law meant there were only two options - leave it unrestricted or ban it entirely until the board of review met. The book was banned for six weeks until the interim order was reviewed and the restriction was lifted.

A new bill has now been passed by the New Zealand parliament that gives the censor board the ability to issue interim orders based on age or specified classes of persons.

National MP Chris Bishop drafted the bill and n the case of Into the River it would have meant the book could have reverted to its R14 status rather than banning it outright. Bishop said after his bill had been passed unanimously. He added:

It is clear that Into the River should not have been banned - this small but useful change will help ensure such a situation doesn't happen again.

The Nile Hilton Incident is a 2017 Sweden / Denmark / Germany / France crime thriller by Tarik Saleh.
Starring Fares Fares, Mari Malek and Yasser Ali Maher.

Set against the backdrop of the Egyptian Revolution, the thriller features a police officer who investigates the murder of a woman. What initially seems to be a killing of a prostitute turns into a more complicated case involving the very elite of Egypt.

Egyptian police raided a tiny alternative film venue in Cairo last week to prevent the screening of a thriller critical of law enforcement that has been banned.

The officers prevented The Nile Hilton Incident from being played in a makeshift, 25-seat theatre because it was a downloaded copy that didn't have government permission to be shown.

The film, by Swedish-Egyptian director Tarik Saleh, is a murder mystery set in Egypt that addresses abuse of power and police corruption. It has won several accolades abroad, including the Grand Jury Prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival.

But it has not been allowed to screen at either the current festival or November's smaller, Panorama of the European Film festival, also in Cairo. The ban echoes last year's action against Last Days of the City by Egyptian director Tamer El Said, whose film was feted abroad but blocked from cinemas in Egypt.

A flyer for ScrewCaps UK, a manufacturer of fastener cover caps, was seen on 15 August 2017. The image featured a naked woman photographed from the back, with the shot slightly angled from below, wearing ski boots, gloves and skis, and carrying ski poles. Red text stating COVER UP partially obscured her bottom.

A complainant, who received the flyer with an order which had been made, challenged whether the ad was offensive and degrading to women.

Pro-Dec Products Ltd t/a ScrewCaps UK said they made a niche product which, whilst useful and practical, was not generally seen as aspirational or covetable. Therefore, to make their unsexy product more noticeable, and in keeping with the product's use in covering other elements, the concept behind their ad was to refer to covering up other things that would not be normally seen.

They said that in the nine years they had been trading in the UK, they had distributed in excess of 20,000 such brochures, using a variety of models in different circumstances around the same theme of covering up. They had received 14 complaints directly, in response to the brochures they had produced. They added that the ad in question had been received by 7,000 people and they estimated, due to the multiplier effect, that 16,000 people would have seen the ad. They had ensured that any customers who had complained directly to them would not receive any further brochures.

ASA Assessment: Complaint upheld

Although the ASA acknowledged that the use of a naked person was intended to create a visual pun linked to the concept of covering up and that some readers might appreciate that the use of such an image was intended to be comical in tone, we considered that the image of a naked woman in ski boots and carrying ski poles bore no relevance to the product being advertised, and that a link between the image of a naked woman on a ski slope and the product -- a cover cap -- was not one that people would normally make.

Although a slogan appeared over her bottom, we considered it would be clear to people that the woman was fully nude, bar her ski boots and gloves. We noted she had her back slightly arched to emphasize her bottom, and her breast was slightly visible from the side. We considered that her nudity was further highlighted as it appeared in the context of a ski scene, where people would ordinarily be warmly dressed. We therefore considered the female nudity was gratuitous and the pose and styling was provocative. On that basis, we considered the image could be seen to be sexually suggestive and degrading to women.

We acknowledged that ScrewCaps UK operated a business-to-business model and that this was generally the context in which their advertising would be seen. Although we considered it was therefore unlikely that children would see the ad, we considered that the image still had the potential to be seen by many people who were likely to find it offensive.

Because of the nudity and styling, as well as the woman's pose, we concluded the image was degrading to women and likely to cause serious offence.

The ad must not appear again in the form complained of. We told ScrewCaps UK not to use similarly sexually suggestive images in their advertising in future.

54% of 12- to 15-year-olds use social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, to access online news, making it the second most popular source of news after television (62%).

The news that children read via social media is provided by third-party websites. While some of these may be reputable news organisations, others may not.

73% of online tweens are aware of the concept of 'fake news', and four in ten (39%) say they have seen a fake news story online or on social media.

The findings are from Ofcom's Children and Parents Media Use and Attitudes Report 2017 . This year, the report examines for the first time how children aged 12 to15 consume news and online content.

Filtering fake news

The vast majority of 12-15s who follow news on social media are questioning the content they see. Almost nine in ten (86%) say they would make at least one practical attempt to check whether a social media news story is true or false.

The main approaches older children say they would take include:

• seeing if the news story appears elsewhere (48% of children who follow news on social media would do this);
• reading comments after the news report in a bid to verify its authenticity (39%);
• checking whether the organisation behind it is one they trust (26%); and
• assessing the professional quality of the article (20%).

Some 63% of 12- to 15-year-olds who are aware of fake news are prepared to do something about it, with 35% saying they would tell their parents or other family member. Meanwhile, 18% would leave a comment saying they thought the news story was fake; and 14% would report the content to the social media website directly.

Children's online lives

More children are using the internet than ever before. Nine in ten (92% of 5- to 15-year-olds) are online in 2017 -- up from 87% last year.

More than half of pre-schoolers (53% of 3-4s) and 79% of 5-7s are online -- a year-on-year increase of 12 percentage points for both these age groups.

Much of this growth is driven by the increased use of tablets: 65% of 3-4s, and 75% of 5-7s now use these devices at home -- up from 55% and 67% respectively in 2016.

Children's social media preferences have also shifted over recent years. In 2014, 69% of 12-15s had a social media profile, and most of these (66%) said their main profile was on Facebook. The number of 12-15s with a profile now stands at 74%, while the number of these who say Facebook is their main profile has dropped to 40%.

Though most social media platforms require users to be 13 or over, they are very popular with younger children. More than a quarter (28%) of 10-year-olds have a social media profile, rising to around half of children aged 11 or 12 (46% and 51% respectively).

Negative online experiences

Half of children (49%) aged 12 to 15 who use the internet say they 'never' see hateful content online. [1] But the proportion of children who have increased this year, from 34% in 2016 to 45% in 2017.

More than a third (37%) of children who saw this type of content took some action. The most common response was to report it to the website in question (17%). Other steps included adding a counter-comment to say they thought it was wrong (13%), and blocking the person who shared or made the hateful comments (12%).

ISP Website blocking

Use of network level filters increased again this year. Nearly two in five parents of 3-4s and 5-15s who have home broadband and whose child goes online use home network-level content filters, and this has increased for both groups since 2016, part of a continuing upward trend.

Use of parental control software (software set up on a particular device, e.g. Net Nanny, McAfee Family Protection) has also increased among parents of 3-4s and 5-15s, to around three in ten.

More than nine in ten parents of 5-15s who use either of these tools consider them useful, and around three-quarters say they block the right amount of content.

One in five parents who use network-level filters think their child would be able to bypass them, although fewer 12-15s say they have done thisOne in five of the parents of 5-15s who use network-level filters say they think their child would be able to unset, bypass or over-ride them; more likely than in 2016. This is similar to the number of 12-15s who say they know how to do this, although fewer say they have ever done it (6%).

Twitter has acknowledged that a day-long block of one of the New York Times's accounts was imposed in error.

The @nytimesworld team, which covers international events, has about 1.9 million followers and is recognised by the social network as being a verified account.

But on Saturday it was locked after posting a report about the Canadian prime minister. The newspaper was told it had violated Twitter's rules about hateful conduct.

The NYT said it had taken Twitter nearly 24 hours to unlock the account and allow it to start posting again.

The supposedly offensive post referred to Justin Trudeau addressing the fact that indigenous children in Canada had been forced to attend boarding schools in the past, where some had been abused

BBFC fees will increase from 1 January 2018.

In 2015, having frozen fees for the previous seven years, and following consultation with the DCMS and industry, we introduced an annual fee formula of RPI minus 1% to ensure our long term income was on a sustainable footing. This sub-inflation formula also carried a built-in need to make annual cost savings in our business while still delivering an efficient service to industry.

In October 2017, the Office for National Statistics announced that September RPI was 3.9% which is higher than recent years. In light of this, and the fact BBFC fees have only increased by 2.3% over the last ten years, although we are keen to retain the RPI minus 1% formula going forward, for 2018, as a one-off good will offering to customers, we propose to deviate from the formula and clip the increase from 2.9% to 2%

We are therefore increasing the fees for our statutory services by 2%, as follows:

• Theatrical submissions: £7.30 per minute and 2£104.57 submission fee

• Video Recordings Act submissions: £6.26 per minute and £78.30 submission fee

See other fees in article from bbfc.co.uk

Padmavati is a 2017 India historical romance by Sanjay Leela Bhansali.
Starring Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh and Shahid Kapoor.

Rani Padmavati (aka Padmini) is said to be one of the most beautiful women to ever exist. This real life story is epitome of Love and sacrifice between Rajput Queen Padmavati and Rana Rawal Ratan Singh, the Rajput ruler of Mewar. Their perfect life took unfortunate turn when Allauddin Khilji's lustful eyes gazed upon Queen Padmavati. Alauddin Khilji is known as one of the most brutal rulers of the Khilji dynasty, who ascended the throne by killing his father-in-law, his brother-in-laws and their uncles. He was known for attacking states, only for their land and women. And, the motive behind the attack on Mewar was none other than royal Rani Padmavati. Chittorgarh fort, today, stands as an epitome of the true Rajputana spirit, loyalty, fidelity and bravery and a symbol of women power.

Producers of a Bollywood period epic have indefinitely delayed its release following countrywide protests by Hindu right-wing and caste groups.

The epic in Awadhi language extols the virtue of Padmavati who committed sati, the practice of a widow immolating herself on her husband's funeral pyre, to protect her honour from the invading Muslim emperor Khilji who had killed her husband, the Rajput king, in a battle.

Sati is believed to have originated some 700 years ago among the ruling class or Rajputs in India. The Rajput women burnt themselves after their men were defeated in battles to avoid being taken by the victors. But it came to be seen as a measure of wifely devotion in later years. The custom was outlawed by India's British rulers in 1829 following demands by Indian reformers.

Historians point out that Jayasi's epic ballad about a Muslim emperor attacking a kingdom smitten by the beauty of a Hindu queen was written in the 16th Century, more than 200 years after the historical record of the invasion. They say the folklore around Padmavati have also been problematic as they have glorified sati.

Rumours of a scene in the film of the Muslim king dreaming of getting romantic with the Hindu queen enraged many like the Rajput Karnik Sena, a fringe caste group, who have called for the film to be banned. Director Bhansali has said the film does not feature such dream sequence at all .

Last week, the group, which had disrupted the shooting and slapped Bhansali on the set of the film earlier this year, vandalised cinemas , and threatened to chop off Padukone's nose, referring to a story in the epic Ramayana where a character has her nose chopped off as punishment.

Rajput community members have burnt effigies of Bhansali and sought a ban of the film. Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje has said it should not be released until necessary changes are made so that sentiments of any community are not hurt.

A regional leader of the BJP at the weekend announced a reward of nearly $1.5m for anyone beheading Bhansali and Padukone .

Update: BBFC Rating

23rd November 2017. See article from bbfc.co.uk

The BBFC has published its rating for the British cinema release of Padmavati. The film is rated 12A uncut for moderate violence, injury detail.

Update: Former Indian film censor claims that the BBFC is acting illegally in passing the film for UK release

24th November 2017 See article from timesnownews.com

Former Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) chairman Pahlaj Nihalani has claimed that the BBFC decision of certifying the movie Padmavati is illegal.

In an interview with ANI, Nihalani said that for a film to get certification overseas, it's a must that it is passed by the Indian Censor Board. If they've got a thumbs up from Britain without even sending the film, it's against the law.

He added that the BBC has no control over the release of an Indian film. If the film is released outside India, it will eventually be pirated to India, he said.

Meanwhile, a petition seeking orders to the makers to not release the film outside India on December 1, has been filed in the Supreme Court.

Back home, Padmavati has been postponed for an indefinite period of time owing to the furious protests against it by the fringe groups - Rajasthan-based Rajput Karni Sena in particular. The groups are protesting an alleged romantic sequence between Padmavati (based on the legend of Rani Padmini of Chittorgarh) and Mughal Emperor Alauddin Khilji. Some fanatic groups are also incensed with the fact that Rani Padmavati has been shown dancing in the film asserting that Rajput maharanis never danced in front of anyone.

Update: Violent Indian nationalists call for British cinemas to be burnt down

24th November 2017 See article from independent.co.uk

British cinemas that screen a controversial new Bollywood blockbuster should be burned down, the leader of a hardline Hindu nationalist group has claimed.

Members of the Rajput Karni Sena, a group associated with the warrior Rajput caste, claim it misrepresents history by depicting a love affair between the queen and a Muslim invader. The group is further upset that the queen's midriff is exposed in a song sequence.

Now the leader of Rajput Karni Sena, Sukhdev Singh has called for action to be taken in the UK. He told Republic TV:

I call on Hindus in the UK and particularly my community brothers to protest against the screening of the film there. I have told them any cinema hall which screens the movie will be burnt.

Update: Safety of Paramount concern

28th November 2017 See article from theguardian.com

British film distributors are reconsidering the release of Padmavati. In the face of the ongoing controversy, the British distributor, Paramount Pictures, said the UK release date was being reviewed, amid reports that producers wanted to clarify the situation in India before making a decision abroad. It had been due to come out from 1 December.

A London-based Hindu campaign group, Rajput Samaj of UK, declared its opposition to the BBFC's decision to certify the film for release and said it would hold a peaceful protest over what it sees as a historically inaccurate account of Padmini. It told the Guardian that it did not want the film to be released but claimed that it was opposed to any violence.

The call from the charity for the film to lose its certification comes after a fringe rightwing group in India threatened violence if UK cinemas showed the film.

The Indian supreme court had agreed to hear a petition next week asking that the film's UK release be banned. Lawyers said it was unlikely the court could prevent an overseas debut, though the film's producers have already said they would await the Indian censor's approval before distributing the movie worldwide.

Update: UK Courts

28th November 2017 See article from theguardian.com

Another UK group is also attempting to get the UK release banned. The Rajasthan Association asked the BBFC about censoring the film, but the BBFC commendably responded that freedom of choice must be respected and that filmmakers are free to explore narratives based on historical events and to interpret them as they wish.

The Rajasthan Association was now mulling the option of approaching UK court in connection with the matter.

The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature is a 2017 Canada / USA / South Korea family animation comedy by Cal Brunker.
Starring Will Arnett, Katherine Heigl and Maya Rudolph.

Surly and his friends, Buddy, Andie and Precious discover that the mayor of Oakton City is cracking one big hustle to build a giant yet quite-shabby amusement park, which in turn will bulldoze their home, which is the city park, and it's up to them and the rest of the park animals to stop the mayor, along with his daughter and a mad animal control officer from getting away with his scheme, and take back the park.

The Australian Review Board has overturned a PG rating from the Classification Board and replaced it with a general audience G rating (equivalent to a UK U rating). The Review Board explains:

A three-member panel of the Classification Review Board has unanimously determined that the film Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature is classified G (General) with the consumer advice Some scenes may scare young children.

The Classification Guidelines provide that at the G category, violence and the treatment of themes should have a very low sense of threat or menace, and be justified by context.

In the Classification Review Board's opinion Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature warrants a G classification because its violence and treatment of themes are of a very mild impact. There are numerous scenes of unrealistic, animated violence which are all resolved with positive outcomes for the animals and are interspersed with humour and are relevant to the context. The theme of the park being destroyed for greed is overall a positive story about animals protecting their habitat and has a very mild sense of threat which is at all times relevant to the context.

The Classification Review Board convened today in response to an application from the original applicant, Roadshow Films to review the decision made by the Classification Board on 18 September 2017 to classify Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature PG with the consumer advice Mild themes and animated violence.

For comparison:

• the UK BBFC rated the film as U uncut for mild comic threat, violence
• the US MPAA rated the film PG for action and some rude humor.

The Daily Mail has lost an advertiser after a social 'juctice' campaign got to work on the High street retailer, Paperchase for advertising in the Daily Mail. The Daily Mail explains:

Last weekend, a few hundred self-appointed activists ho joined a campaign to silence Britain's free Press, which is enjoyed by millions, and force it to promote their views.

Together, they persuaded the High Street retailer Paperchase to apologise for offering free wrapping paper to Daily Mail readers.

This group's campaign was organised by Stop Funding Hate, a small lobby group seeking to censor popular newspapers whose editorial lines it disagrees with.

On a daily basis, it urges people to use Twitter and Facebook to send complaints against any company which advertises in the Daily Mail, Sun and Express newspapers.

The aim is to persuade firms to withdraw advertising. Stop Funding Hate's founder declares: The end point for us is a media that does the job we all want it to.

In other words, a handful of zealots want newspapers to reflect only their values, which, of course, may very well be unpalatable to the values of the millions who chose to read them.

Stop Funding Hate seems particularly concerned that the Press discusses subjects such as immigration and gender politics.

The Daily Mail continues its criticism in a very aggressive article about the censorship campaign, Stop Funding Hate. See article from dailymail.co.uk

And Spiked agrees with the broad thrust of the Daily Mail's criticism. Spiked notes:

Stop Funding Hate, founded by Richard Wilson (a former corporate fundraising officer at Amnesty International), claims to believe in free speech -- and to be politically neutral. And yet, these are the things it labels as hate speech: speaking out in support of Brexit; tougher immigration policies; opposition to Islamism; and support for Christian values on marriage and gender. Everything Stop Funding Hate does is aimed at closing down the freedom of speech and the economic viability of the tabloids it despises for expressing political views it opposes.

Read the Spiked comments in an article from spiked-online.com

Twitter announced yesterday that it would begin removing verification badges for famous tweeters that it does not approve of. Not for what is tweeted, but for offline behaviour Twitter does not like.

The key phrase in Twitter's policy update is this one: Reasons for removal may reflect behaviors on and off Twitter. Before yesterday, the rules explicitly applied only to behavior on Twitter. From now on, holders of verified badges will be held accountable for their behavior in the real world as well. Twitter has promised further information about the new censorship policy in due course.

Many questions remain unanswered. What will the company's review consist of? How will it examine users' offline behavior? Will it simply respond to reports, or will it actively look for violations? Will it handle the work with its existing team, or will it expand its trust and safety team?

Twitter has immediately rescinded blue tick verification from accounts belonging to far-right activists, including Jason Kessler, a US white supremacist, and Tommy Robinson, founder of the English Defence League.

Offsite Comment: Twitter has turned its back on free speech

The platform plans to exercise ideological control over its users.

25th November 2017. See article from spiked-online.com Andrew Doyle

A study by Princeton researchers came to light earlier this month, revealing that over 400 of the world's most popular websites use the equivalent of hacking tools to spy on you without your knowledge or consent.

Using session replay scripts from third-party companies, websites are recording your every act, from mouse moves to clicks, to keylogging what you type, and extracting your personal info off the page. If you accidentally paste something into a text field from your clipboard, like an address or password you didn't want to type out, the scripts can record, transmit, and store that, too.

What these sites are doing with this information, and how much they anonymize or secure it, is a crapshoot.

Among top retail offenders recording your every move and mistake are Costco, Gap.com, Crate and Barrel, Old Navy, Toys R Us, Fandango, Adidas, Boots, Neiman Marcus, Nintendo, Nest, the Disney Store, and Petco.

Tech and security websites spying on users include HP.com, Norton, Lenovo, Intel Autodesk, Windows, Kaspersky, Redhat.com, ESET.com, WP Engine, Logitech, Crunchbase, HPE.com (Hewlett Packard Enterprise), Akamai, Symantec, Comodo.com, and MongoDB.

Other sites you might recognize that are also using active session recording are RT.com, Xfinity, T-Mobile, Comcast, Sputnik News, iStockphoto, IHG (InterContinental Hotels), British Airways, NatWest, Western Union, FlyFrontier.com, Spreadshirt, Deseret News, Bose, and Chevrolet.com

Plan to install wifi in Brighton council care homes have been ditched over selfish worries of being held responsible for downloading copyrighted material.

Elderly residents in 25 care units were to get internet access as part of a drive to encourage them to go online. But the proposed scheme was scrapped after the disgraceful housing boss Anne Meadows said there were concerns old people might access inappropriate material. She whined:

There are particular challenges on security and the council's liability when providing access in a communal setting. Not least in people accessing illegal or inappropriate material.

Mike Bojczuk, a volunteer spearheading the wifi plan, said the council was insisting on a far higher level of security than was necessary.

About this proposal for Baywatch Changing Rooms. How is that 'diverse? It celebrates the sexuality of the community of people who are both transgender and gay. In particular those who are uncomfortable in their roles as straight men and who fantasise about identifying as gay women .

Ofcom boss Sharon White has urged the BBC to lead the way on diversity in a talk at the Westminster Media Forum.

She spoke as the TV censor published revised guidance for broadcasters on promoting equal employment.

White told the forum that nothing has the power to shape our culture, values and national identity as much as television. She said arge numbers of older people, particularly women, say they feel negatively portrayed on screen. And of those who come from an ethnic minority group, many see themselves portrayed neutrally or negatively.

There was an urgent need for broadcasters to reach and reflect every corner of modern Britain, White said.

To ensure the BBC delivers on screen, Ofcom is launching an in-depth review to understand how well the corporation represents and portrays all members of society. She said:

We will be looking at the range and portrayal of people on screen (and) on air, including in popular peak-time shows.

Ofcom is requiring the BBC to implement a new Commissioning Code of Practice for diversity, covering both on-screen portrayal and casting, as well as workforce diversity.

The European Union voted on November 14, to pass the new internet censorship regulation nominally in the name of consumer protection. But of course censorship often hides behind consumer protection, eg the UK's upcoming internet porn ban is enacted in the name of protecting under 18 internet consumers.

The new EU-wide law gives extra power to national consumer protection agencies, but which also contains a vaguely worded clause that also grants them the power to block and take down websites without judicial oversight.

Member of the European Parliament Julia Reda said in a speech in the European Parliament Plenary during a last ditch effort to amend the law:

The new law establishes overreaching Internet blocking measures that are neither proportionate nor suitable for the goal of protecting consumers and come without mandatory judicial oversight,

According to the new rules, national consumer protection authorities can order any unspecified third party to block access to websites without requiring judicial authorization, Reda added later in the day on her blog .

This new law is an EU regulation and not a directive, meaning its obligatory for all EU states.

The new law proposal started out with good intentions, but sometimes in the spring of 2017, the proposed regulation received a series of amendments that watered down some consumer protections but kept intact the provisions that ensured national consumer protection agencies can go after and block or take down websites.

Presumably multinational companies had been lobbying for new weapons n their battle against copyright infringement. For instance, the new law gives national consumer protection agencies the legal power to inquire and obtain information about domain owners from registrars and Internet Service Providers.

Besides the website blocking clause, authorities will also be able to request information from banks to detect the identity of the responsible trader, to freeze assets, and to carry out mystery shopping to check geographical discrimination or after-sales conditions.

Comment: European Law Claims to Protect Consumers... By Blocking the Web

23rd November 2017 See article from eff.org

Last week the European Parliament passed a new Consumer Protection Regulation [PDF] that allows national consumer authorities to order ISPs, web hosts and domain registries to block or delete websites... all without a court order. The websites targeted are those that allegedly infringe European consumer law. But European consumer law has some perplexing provisions that have drawn ridicule, including a prohibition on children blowing up balloons unsupervised and a ban on excessively curvy bananas. Because of these, the range of websites that could be censored is both vast and uncertain.

The Consumer Protection Regulation provides in Article 8(3)(e) that consumer protection authorities must have the power:

where no other effective means are available to bring about the cessation or the prohibition of the infringement including by requesting a third party or other public authority to implement such measures, in order to prevent the risk of serious harm to the collective interests of consumers:

• to remove content or restrict access to an online interface or to order the explicit display of a warning to consumers when accessing the online interface;

• to order a hosting service provider to remove, disable or restrict the access to an online interface; or

• where appropriate, order domain registries or registrars to delete a fully qualified domain name and allow the competent authority concerned to register it;

The risks of unelected public authorities being given the power to block websites was powerfully demonstrated in 2014, when the Australian company regulator ASIC accidentally blocked 250,000 websites in an attempt to block just a handful of sites alleged to be defrauding Australian consumers.

This likelihood of unlawful overblocking is just one of the reasons that the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression and Opinion has underlined how web blocking often contravenes international human rights law. In a 2011 report [PDF], then Special Rapporteur Frank La Rue set out how extremely limited are the circumstances in which blocking of websites can be justified, noting that where:

the specific conditions that justify blocking are not established in law, or are provided by law but in an overly broad and vague manner, [this] risks content being blocked arbitrarily and excessively. ... [E]ven where justification is provided, blocking measures constitute an unnecessary or disproportionate means to achieve the purported aim, as they are often not sufficiently targeted and render a wide range of content inaccessible beyond that which has been deemed illegal. Lastly, content is frequently blocked without the intervention of or possibility for review by a judicial or independent body.

This describes exactly what the new Consumer Protection Regulation will do. It hands over a power that should only be exercised, if at all, under the careful scrutiny of a judge in the most serious of cases, and allows it to be wielded at the whim of an unelected consumer protection agency. As explained by Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Julia Reda , who voted against the legislation, it sets the stage for the construction of a censorship infrastructure that could be misused for purposes that we cannot even anticipate, ranging from copyright enforcement through to censorship of political protest.

Regrettably, the Regulation is now law--and is required to be enforced by all European states. It is both ironic and tragic that a law intended to protect consumers actually poses such a dire threat to their right to freedom of expression.

An ad for BOCA organic toothpastes was seen in the Raconteur supplement which was included in the Times newspaper on 28 July 2017. The ad featured a black and white image of the body of a naked woman, who was wearing only a pair of strappy heels. The woman in the image was shown reclining in a chair and facing a window, with one leg placed on top of a table by the window and the other on the ground. Her buttocks and her groin area were obscured by the arm of the chair. The woman was also shown to be holding a tube of the product.

Two complainants, who believed that the ad objectified women, challenged whether the ad was offensive.

ASA Assessment: Complaints upheld

The ASA noted that the image in the ad showed only parts of the model's body, including the lower parts of her breasts, her stomach, and her bare legs. We noted that her buttocks and groin area had been obscured by the arm of the chair, and her head, the top parts of the arms and torso, including her nipples, were out of the frame and therefore were not visible. We noted BOCA's comments that the model in the ad was not naked and acknowledged that the ad did not include explicit nudity. However, we considered that the way in which the model was depicted gave the impression that the model was fully nude.

We considered that the pose of the model, particularly given that she was shown as reclining with her parted legs facing an open window, was sexually provocative, giving the ad a voyeuristic feel. Furthermore, because the model's face was not shown, we considered that the visible parts of her torso, including her lower portion of her breasts, and the lower half of her body became the visual emphasis of the ad, which was likely to draw readers' attention. We also considered that the nudity and the pose of the model, and the provocative nature of the ad, bore no relevance to the product. Because the ad placed visual emphasis on the model's body in a sexualised manner and such nudity was unrelated to the product, we considered that the ad objectified the model depicted and invited readers to view her body as a sexual object. For those reason, we considered that the ad objectified women and concluded that it was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.

The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told BOCA to ensure that future advertising did not cause widespread or serious offence by objectifying women.

Loot boxes are used to monetise games by allowing gamers to buy items that will prove useful in the game. The games designers seem to favour a lucky dip approach to the goodies that are sold leading to accusations of gambling as some loot boxes may prove better than others.

This week Belgium's Minister of Justice has deemed that the selling of loot boxes should be classed as gambling.

This comment comes after Belgium's Gaming Commission launched an investigation into loot boxes last week stating, The mixing of money and addiction is gambling.

Belgium's Minister of Justice Koen Geens has also weighed in on the issue and said:

Mixing gambling and gaming, especially at a young age, is dangerous for the mental health of the child.

Geens has stressed he is looking to have features such as look boxes banned in Belgium when the user does now know what they are receiving when they purchase. Geens noted that a ban will take time as he will have to proceed with the ban via Europe.

An Adelaide Catholic school has been forced to cover and cordon off a new statue after the unfortunate placement of a loaf of bread caused a stir online.

Blackfriars Priory School unveiled the statue of St Dominic last week, in which the religious icon is depicted handing a young boy a loaf of bread. But due to a long history of child abuse by the clergy, people saw the loaf of bread as an allusion to a penis.

The school covered the statue with a black cloth after students were found taking inappropriate photos .