Posts Tagged: "web hosting"

Is Europe really moving away from protecting platforms and internet intermediaries?

This time last year, the combination of the Commission’s September 2017 Communication and the proposed Article 13 of the draft Copyright Directive led some to conclude that Europe was indeed moving away from protecting internet intermediaries. The Communication has now been backed up by the March 2018 Commission Recommendation and proposed new Regulation (with its focus on terrorist content). Whether Article 13 is ever enacted and in what form is still to be decided, but it is closer to adoption now than before the vote in September 2018. Meanwhile, we await answers from the CJEU regarding the permissible subject-matter breadth and territorial width of injunctions made against intermediaries.

Facilitating ‘fake news’ through legitimate website prohibited by court in the Netherlands

In a remarkable judgment of 10 January 2018 a court in the Netherlands ordered a hosting provider to make a legitimate website permanently inaccessible because it was “part of an unlawful concept”. The plaintiffs in this case have been harassed on the internet by a non-existing organization called G|A|B|M|E, which supposedly stands for ‘Global Advisory Board Middle East’. One of the plaintiffs received an e-mail on 1 December 2017 warning him that in a few hours a “report” would be released revealing him, his companies and some employees as frauds. Indeed, a few hours later a publication was distributed via the internet with the title ‘International Security and Fraud Alert Iranian Fraud’. In this publication (the ‘report’) the plaintiff, his companies and some employees were wrongly accused of fraud, corruption and money laundering… The decision has definitely broadened the liability of hosting providers and has rendered those who are the victims of defamation a new tool to fight accusations on the internet, but one has to bear in mind that the circumstances of this case were and are exceptional.

The First 3 Steps to Starting a Website or Blog

With the growing trend of online marketing for business, it has become important to have a distinct Internet presence. A blog can give help you raise your search engine ranking, get more traffic and even win over more customers. Setting up your own business blog isn’t difficult if you know the steps to take. Here are the first three critical steps, or action items, to setting up your blog, or just going down the path of setting up a website.