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      Google to SCOTUS: Liability for promoting terrorist videos will ruin the Internet

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Friday, 13 January, 2023 - 20:06

    Google to SCOTUS: Liability for promoting terrorist videos will ruin the Internet

    Enlarge (credit: NurPhoto / Contributor | NurPhoto )

    For years , YouTube has been accused of enabling terrorist recruitment. This allegedly happens when a user clicks on a terrorist video hosted on the platform, then spirals down a rabbit hole of extremist content automatically queued “up next” through YouTube’s recommendation engine. In 2016, the family of Nohemi Gonzalez—who was killed in a 2015 Paris terrorist attack after extremists allegedly relied on YouTube for recruitment—sued YouTube owner Google, forcing courts to consider YouTube’s alleged role in aiding and abetting terrorists. Google has been defending YouTube ever since. Then, last year, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case .

    Now, the Gonzalez family is hoping that the high court will agree that Section 230 protections designed to shield websites from liabilities for hosting third-party content shouldn’t be extended to also protect platforms’ right to recommend harmful content.

    Google thinks that’s exactly how the liability shield should work, though. Yesterday, in a court filing , Google argued that Section 230 protects YouTube’s recommendation engine as a legitimate tool “meant to facilitate the communication and content of others.”

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      Section 230 shields TikTok in child’s “Blackout Challenge” death lawsuit

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Thursday, 27 October, 2022 - 19:05

    Section 230 shields TikTok in child’s “Blackout Challenge” death lawsuit

    Enlarge (credit: Anadolu Agency / Contributor | Anadolu Agency )

    As lawsuits continue piling up against social media platforms for allegedly causing harms to children, a Pennsylvania court has ruled that TikTok is not liable in one case where a 10-year-old named Nylah Anderson died after attempting to complete a “Blackout Challenge” she discovered on her “For You” page.

    The challenge recommends that users choke themselves until they pass out, and Nylah’s mother, Tawainna Anderson, initially claimed that TikTok’s defective algorithm was responsible for knowingly feeding the deadly video to her child. The mother hoped that Section 230 protections under the Communications Decency Act—which grant social platforms immunity for content published by third parties—would not apply in the case, but ultimately, the judge found that TikTok was immune.

    TikTok’s “algorithm was a way to bring the Challenge to the attention of those likely to be most interested in it,” Judge Paul Diamond wrote in a memorandum before issuing his order. “In thus promoting the work of others, Defendants published that work—exactly the activity Section 230 shields from liability. The wisdom of conferring such immunity is something properly taken up with Congress, not the courts.”

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      Reform Section 230, punish users spreading online hate: New York AG

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Tuesday, 18 October, 2022 - 22:06

    Reform Section 230, punish users spreading online hate: New York AG

    Enlarge (credit: YUKI IWAMURA / Contributor | AFP )

    On a mission to stop young men from being increasingly radicalized online , New York Attorney General Letitia James suggested today a new strategy to stop online hate from spreading: Punish anyone who reposts content created by those who commit homicide.

    Her potentially First Amendment-infringing policy reform recommendation comes after the Bureau of Internet and Technology and the Hate Crimes Unit of the Civil Rights Bureau conducted an investigation into how online platforms—including Reddit, Discord, 4chan, 8chan, Twitch, and YouTube—helped a white gunman prepare and then murder 10 Black people in Buffalo, New York, during a mass shooting in May.

    According to the Office of the Attorney General, the gunman's content, including snippets of his manifesto, was shared across mainstream platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. Among other solutions proposed, James and New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced that they want lawmakers to establish a civil liability so that no one shares extremist content, which can potentially inspire copycats.

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      SCOTUS weighs first case testing Big Tech liability for recommending content

      news.movim.eu / ArsTechnica · Monday, 3 October, 2022 - 19:03

    SCOTUS weighs first case testing Big Tech liability for recommending content

    Enlarge (credit: NurPhoto / Contributor | NurPhoto )

    A key protection shielding social media companies from liability for hosting third-party content—Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act—is set to face its first US Supreme Court challenge.

    The question before the court hinges on whether Google-owned YouTube is responsible for aiding and abetting ISIS terrorists by actively recommending ISIS videos to users via its algorithms.

    According to plaintiffs , ISIS allegedly relied on YouTube during efforts to ramp up recruitment before the terrorist group took credit for killing 130 people and injuring more than 350 others during six coordinated attacks in 2015. The lawsuit now headed to the Supreme Court focuses on the killing of an American woman named Nohemi Gonzalez, who was dining in a Paris bistro when ISIS militants attacked.

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