Google bosses convicted in Italy for User Content

In a bizarre display of Italian privacy protection, Google bosses have been found guilty for infringing the privacy of an individual who was attacked, videoed and shared online using the Google Video Service. BBC News Article Here.

Italy of course have now an interesting set of cases making various parts of ‘normal’ web activity illegal. Remember when then made all blogs illegal as they amounted to “clandestine” press?

So - what are the options now for ISPs? The technological approach could mean the masking of faces from videos automatically, using similar face recognition technology employed in Google Street View. Costly and only for the big firms. Option 2, pull out of Italy; again costly but easiest. Thirdly appeal.

This is the best option. As far as I can determine (with my limited Italian - awaiting a good translation of the judgement to land in my inbox), the judgement goes against the European Directive 2000/31/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market (‘Directive on electronic commerce’) article which states that…

Article 12

“Mere conduit”

1. Where an information society service is provided that consists of the transmission in a communication network of information provided by a recipient of the service, or the provision of access to a communication network, Member States shall ensure that the service provider is not liable for the information transmitted, on condition that the provider:

(a) does not initiate the transmission;

(b) does not select the receiver of the transmission; and

(c) does not select or modify the information contained in the transmission.

1. The acts of transmission and of provision of access referred to in paragraph 1 include the automatic, intermediate and transient storage of the information transmitted in so far as this takes place for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission in the communication network, and provided that the information is not stored for any period longer than is reasonably necessary for the transmission.

2. This Article shall not affect the possibility for a court or administrative authority, in accordance with Member States’ legal systems, of requiring the service provider to terminate or prevent an infringement.

NB This is implemented in the UK as the The Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002.