IP: Re: Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

In my view laws which are not to be strictly enforced have two problems. One, they lessen the respect for the laws. 
After all who judges which laws are to be obeyed and which not. Two and most important in many countries (maybe 
especially the USA), future governments can use those laws to arrest and jail people who really believed those laws 
were never to be enforced. That opens up real opportunities for bad behavior on the part of governmentss djf


Date: Sun, 1 Nov 1998 17:23:36 +0100
From: Jacob Palme <jpalme () dsv su se>

A description of the new Swedish law can be found at URL:

   http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme/society/personal-register-law.html

Two important notes in order to understand this law:

(1) The law is based on a EU directive, all EU countries which faithfully
    implement the EU directive will have the same problems.

(2) The new law has been very heatedly discussed in Sweden in the last
    weeks, and it is probable that it will not in reality be implemented
    to the letter. Thus, the people who said they had to skip providing
    list archives, can continue to do so, the risk of them being prosecuted
    is very little.

There is another new Swedish law, the so-called BBS-law, see URL:
   http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme/society/swedish-bbs-act.html

This law gives providers of services such as mailing list archives some
responsibility for certain kinds of illegal messages in the list archives.
However, it is enough, to conform with the law, to have an abuse process,
which will remove illegal messages from the list archives. The only
kinds of illegal messages which the law applies to are incitation to
revolt, racial agitation and copyright violations.

At 00.17 +0100 98-11-01, Steven Clift wrote:
> 2 messages on developments in Sweden.
>
> ------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
> From:          Steven Clift <clift () publicus net>
> Subject:       DW: Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?
> To:            Multiple recipients of list DO-WIRE <do-wire () tc umn edu>
>
> *** Democracies Online Newswire - http://www.e-democracy.org/do ***
>
>
> Sweden Outlaws Discussion Archives?
>
> In my "Democracy is Online" article
> <http://www.e-democracy.org/do/article.html> I concluded with:
>
>   Perhaps the most democratizing aspect of the Internet is the
>   ability for people to organize and communicate in groups.
>   It is within the context of electronic free assembly and
>   association that citizens will gain new opportunities for
>   participation and a voice in politics, governance, and
>   society."
>
> Today I was attempting to access an e-mail list archive for the
> OldNorseNet <http://www.hum.gu.se/arkiv/> and ran into this:
>
>   Our discussion lists archive
>
>   1998-10-24.
>   Due to a new swedish law (harmonizing to the EU directives)
>   we are no longer allowed to publish archives of our
>   discussion lists. This will be a severe obstacle for the
>   democracy and the free debate.
>
>   Back to Faculty of Arts homepage
>
> While I need to gather more information, the fact that open, public
> discussions among people online are illegal to archive, perhaps even
> to have is quite startling.  Restrictions on electronic assembly and
> association, including the ability of forum hosts to offer the value
> of resulting discussions in an archive, is an even more severe
> restraint than free speech restrictions on far right expression we see
> in many European countries.
>
> Below are a number of URLs and some text that I ran into.  "Jag talar
> inte Svenska" and I couldn't find a Babelfish for Swedish to English
> on the net, so if our Swedish subscribers could update us on this
> story that would be much appreciated.
>
>
> Steven Clift
> Democracies Online
> P.S. I'll likely be in Stockholm for a few days between Jan 11 - 15.
> I'd like to meet with those involved on both sides of this issue to
> learn more.
>
>
> > From <http://www.bitos.org/kampanj/veta_mer.html> I found
> amazing stuff from: http://www.pul.nu/
>
>
> Directly from: http://www.pul.nu/sid2eng.html
>
> Swedish law limits freedom of speech on the internet The 24th of
> October Sweden got a new law on personal data, "PUL", which is based
> on EU legislation. The law makes it illegal to give names public on
> the net, without the mentioned persons "unmistakable consent". The new
> legislation threatens freedom of speech.
>
> The law makes it illegal to critique people on trade union or other
> organisations home- and chatpages. The punishment: Up to two years in
> prison.
>
> The law makes an exception for "journalistic purposes", but not for
> information purposes. Similar legislation is alreday, or will be,
> adopted in other EU-countries. The legislation is based on the EU data
> directive.
>
> This site analyses the law and it's consequences for freedom of speech
> on the net. But also how it will effect swedish trade unions and
> organisations with homepages on the net.
>
> It also gives an example on how Swedish communities already are
> affected by the recent legislation. The Community Gällivare in the
> arctic part of Sweden has had a long fight with the Swedish Data
> inspection on the right to publish protocols from municipal board
> meetings on the net. The problem: The protocols contain names of
> people.
>
> CONTENT
>
> The Gällivare case and the fight about names on the internet
>
> ENGLISH LINKS
>
> European Commission Legal Advisory Board: Regulation of internet
> content
>
> European Union about illegal and harmful content on the Internet
>
> Illustration: Martin Odell c
>
> "Time to bring back anonymity"
>
> The Quote "Time to bring back anonymity" comes from Ms Anitha
> Bondestam, general director of the Swedish data inspection. In a
> English brochure from 1995 she argues for more anonymity - and
> welcomes the EU data directive on which the new Swedish legislation is
> built.
>
>                                       ______________________
>
> About the illustrator
>
> Martin Odell is a Swedish illustrator who works for Magazines such as
> "Journalisten", given out by the Swedish union of Journalists and
> Statstjänstemannen, given out by the union of public employees
>
> About the site
>
> This page is a part of the site "Personuppgiftslagen och
> yttrandefriheten", produced in June 1998 by Christoph Andersson and
> Susanne Bertman as a final project for the course "Global electronic
> journalism", given at JMK, Stockholm university
> http://www.jmk.su.se/global/ global98/private/christop/
> finalpro/pul.htm
>
> A updated version of this site, swedish version only, can be found on
> these two addresses: http://www.pul.nu http://www.fgj.se
>  -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
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>    3454 Fremont Ave S, Mpls, MN 55408 T:+1.612.822.8667
>
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>
> Date sent:        Sun, 25 Oct 1998 06:28:50 -0500
> To:               ip-sub-1 () majordomo pobox com
> From:             Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>
> Subject:          IP: New Swedish law makes most of the Internet
> illegal Send reply to:    farber () cis upenn edu
>
> Date: Sun, 25 Oct 1998 08:51:12 +0200
> From: Jacob Palme <jpalme () dsv su se>
> Subject: New Swedish law makes most of the Internet illegal
>
> A new Swedish law which makes most of the Internet illegal
> in Sweden took effect yesterday. The law is named personal
> information handling law. It makes much of the publication
> of information about individual persons on the Internet
> illegal, such as criticism of named persons, publication of
> lists of references in scientific papers or the sending of
> e-mail messages outside of Europe.
>
> More about the new law at URL
>    http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme/society/personal-register-law.html
>
> (note: The Swedish government will probably not use the law
> to stop Internet. This law and other laws like it have made
> me understand that laws are not meant to be obeyed.)
>
> Question: All other EU countries are to enact similar laws.
> Have other countries interpreted the EU directive in the
> same way, and developed laws which would make most of the
> Internet illegal?
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> -- Jacob Palme <jpalme () dsv su se> (Stockholm University and KTH) for
> more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jacob Palme <jpalme () dsv su se> (Stockholm University and KTH)
for more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme