Coming soon to an internet near you

[Connie Fournier]

The left is getting it!

Tuesday, May 10, 2011


Coming soon to an internet near you

"Will anonymity and hyperlinks be illegal in Canada?" Good question! Bill C-51, the Investigative Powers for the 21st Century Act has some issues, to say the least. Namely, these ones that are highlighted by a Maclean's blogger this afternoon:


From the Library of Parliament’s legislative summary:

Clause 5 of the bill provides that the offences of public incitement of hatred and wilful promotion of hatred may be committed… by creating a hyperlink that directs web surfers to a website where hate material is posted.
That’s just stunningly ignorant. Let’s put aside the ridiculous leap of reason that equates linking to something with saying something, and instead direct our attention to the sheer stupidity of this law on technological grounds. Namely, we usually do not have control of the things we link to. They can change. So if something I link to later becomes “hate material” then I will suddenly be guilty of a hate crime. Any sound legal advice in a country where such a law exists would be to stop using hyperlinks entirely, as they present too great a liability. And that would sort of kind of make the Internet itself illegal.

<a href=http://impolitical.blogspot.com/2011/05/coming-soon-to-internet-near-you.html>Read more....</a>

[Connie Fournier]

MacLeans' take on this:

http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/05/10/will ... in-canada/

[pirapoi]

Will anonymity and hyperlinks be illegal in Canada?" Good question!

Well, the word is really getting out (with bonus plug)

The Lawful Access Legislation: Does it Really Criminalize Linking & Anonymity?
The government's plans to include lawful access provisions within its omnibus crime bill has attracted mounting attention in recent days as many commentators express concern that the legislation could create criminal liability for linking to content that incites hatred and for using anonymous or false names online. The concerns started at the Free Dominion site and have since spread to Brian Lilley at the Toronto Sun and Jesse Brown's blog at Maclean's.

. . .

Yet while lawful access raises many issues (such that it clearly does not belong in an omnibus bill placed on the fast track), I do not believe that creating criminal liability for linking or anonymous speech are among them.
<a href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5794/125/"target="_blank"> Michael Geist - today's column</a>

[cinyc]

I think Geist's argument about why the anonymity concerns are overstated is a bit stronger than his argument that it doesn't criminalize linking. If the bill's language is vague - i.e. "making available", it won't be long before an enterprising prosecutor argues that the legislative summary gives the provision meaning and, despite what the courts said prior, it includes hyperlinking, for the bill was enacted to stop the path that those courts were otherwise going down regarding the practice of hyperlinking. That argument may or may not work, but even if it doesn't, it could end up causing a lot of angst for the first person caught up in it.

[Peter O'Donnell]

Glad to hear that the concerns are spreading ... Jay Currie has a thread on this subject as well (not that he's a leftist).

[backhoe]

I have said from the beginning that everyone- conservative or liberal, right or left, independent or indifferent- needs to be concerned with this little power grab.

Regardless of where you stand, rest assured that if you stand by, silent, while this passes?

Eventually, you will be silenced, too.

And then, what will you do?

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