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4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

alecmuffett.com

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Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#741

Post by Nevermark »

mothballed wrote: post #736
Nevermark wrote: post #730

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding: HIPAA prohibits share private medical information that isn't yours. Regardless of signing anything or how you got it. And no medical establishment can (legally) share records with you, without a legal purpose, and documentation you know your obligations or are legally allowed to have the information. Nobody cares what your opinion is, without an explanation. This is HN. Two-way curiosity and friendl…

Yes you understand now. Every time you understand, you move the goal posts. You've moved them twice now, this time simply declaring the speech you don't like "isn't yours." At first it was about offenses that cause harm, then it was essentially about contract law. And then when you found out there was no contract, then you just moved the goal posts to the patient owning the information inside the provider's brain. Th…

I was certainly thinking about things more. Part of a normal discussion is people try to be clearer with their thinking as they discuss something.

And clarifying can be either or both tuning reasoning or tuning communication.

You realize you can nit pic at almost any comment with some validity?

And you didn’t include any of your own substantive thoughts, which I apparently moved closer to, until your second comment after I asked you for them?

So what to do? Just communicate in a positive and clear way yourself if you have something to add.

I come here to learn. I would rather learn from you than wonder why you make negative comments, in a discussion where you and your thoughts are welcome.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#742

Post by beowulfey »

Ray20 wrote: post #593
beowulfey wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No because the sale would have had to occur in the place that it is illegal

Obviously, yes. A crime is a crime, so what difference does it make what country it was committed in?

I'm sorry that you are not familiar with how laws work but it's kind of a big concept and I don't really have time now to teach it to you. I would recommend Wikipedia or perhaps ChatGPT to get started.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#744

Post by DaSHacka »

dyauspitr wrote: post #305
DaSHacka wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of these things happen, but even if either was miraculously true, should the onus be on the entirety of society to self-censor, or on the kids parents to parent properly (IE use parental controls and supervise screen time)?

Entire society to self censor. Individual parental level controls are ineffective. It’s like keeping your child from having a smart phone at school but then they just become a social pariah since everyone else has one. It only works if no kids are allowed to bring their smartphones to school.

That's still not on the onus of society, but just on the school.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#745

Post by PaulRobinson »

Levitz wrote: post #587
intended wrote: post #553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

4chan is 100% FUD and is playing to the gallery. This is nerd sniping of a different sort. I’m guessing they are aiming to drum up American sentiment for their actions, and because its 4chan.

4chan is perfectly aware of its reputation, and if that wasn't enough, it's worth noting they banded with kiwifarms on this one: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clyjq40vjl7o >Lawyers representing controversial online forums 4chan and Kiwi Farms have filed a legal case against the UK Online Safety Act enforcer, Ofcom. Drumming up public support is a no-go. Rather, I think the intent is to make the stance that if the…

The way the UK has chosen to do that is to ask companies to find the way that works best for them, rather than impose a single government-owned firewall solution. Those that don't will face UK fines in UK jurisdictions, which they may or may not care about.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#746

Post by PaulRobinson »

wyager wrote: post #490
PaulRobinson wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not quite. Ofcom in their reply make their point clear: "The [Online Safety] Act explicitly grants Ofcom the legal authority to regulate online safety for individuals in the United Kingdom [...]" They are stating that companies operating in the UK and providing services to UK individuals, are required to conform with UK regulations in relation to those services, under UK law. As an American business, you can choose t…

4chan is not "operating in the UK". They accept and respond to packets from the UK. If the UK government doesn't like this, they can block 4chan themselves.

The regulation - and the actions Ofcom are taking - are saying "look, you can deal with this, or you can get blocked and pay our fines the moment we have a way of being able to enforce them. What's it going to be?". 4chan are saying neither. Which means they're going to get blocked.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#747

Post by NicuCalcea »

grayhatter wrote: post #670
NicuCalcea wrote: post #617

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why is it the website operators job to figure out where people are from? Why not? It's their responsibility to comply with UK laws if they want to keep serving British customers and making money off of them. Just because the service is provided online doesn't mean it can go on unregulated. You're acting like this is something new that websites haven't had to do for decades.

> > Why is it the website operators job to figure out where people are from? > Why not? Because laws vary from location to location, and it's an unreasonable for a [UK] agency to make demands from an exclusively [US] group under the assumption that they are aware of every possible law in existence. Someone in the [US] can't expect to have reasonable influence over the laws in the [UK] that they're now required to fol…

> under the assumption that they are aware of every possible law in existence

That's why Ofcom started the correspondence, to inform 4chan of laws it may not have been aware of.

> Someone in the [US] can't expect to have reasonable influence over the laws in the [UK] that they're now required to follow

UK companies comply with US laws all the time if they want to continue serving US audiences. I wish this wasn't the case, but this isn't new. Similarly, lots of US news websites aren't available in the EU/UK because they don't comply with GDPR. None of this is new, there's lots of precedent for it.

> You're still trying to apply rules for jurisdiction, that don't map well to the Internet

Sure they do. When I go to boards.4chan.org, the server recognises my request, including where it's coming from, and returns some content. Similarly, when I buy lemonade from a company, they see my shipping address and ships the lemonade. Seems to me like it maps pretty well.

> To call internet geolocation complex or error prone would be an understatement

All other service providers have imposed IP-based limits and that has satisfied Ofcom, so no need to make it more complex than necessary.

> Legal or not, unreasonable demands deserve rejection.

Of course, 4chan is free to reject the demands, just like The Pirate Bay (based in Sweden) have rejected demands from the US government, that was always an option. Ofcom is making the demands to then be able to enforce the OSA, for example by blocking 4chan, without 4chan saying they were not aware of the demands.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#748

Post by vrindavan1 »

jjmarr wrote: post #650
aftbit wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>every tech company engages in regulatory alignment for the entire Middle East Can someone expand on this a bit? I'm passingly familiar with the Chinese Google example (though I thought Google left the market rather than bend the knee?) but I know nearly nothing about the Middle East angle.

On a photocopier, if I switch the language to Arabic, Hebrew disappears from the list of options.

This is so funny

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#749

Post by ivan_gammel »

Levitz wrote: post #740
ivan_gammel wrote: post #668

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A rather strange conclusion from my words. I do not assume it’s profitable, but it’s pretty logical that a for-profit organization running a service that is based on user engagement will have its revenue from the sources linked to the audience, be it advertising, subscriptions or donations. If you cut a visible slice of that audience, it’s going to impact the revenue. It’s still not profitable, 10 years after acquisi…

What makes you think it's a "for-profit organization"? Or that it has investors?

It does have investors according to sources cited by Wikipedia. Whether it’s non-profit or for-profit LLC and on what terms it was acquired doesn’t matter at all.

Re: 4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence

#750

Post by grayhatter »

NicuCalcea wrote: post #747
grayhatter wrote: post #670

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > Why is it the website operators job to figure out where people are from? > Why not? Because laws vary from location to location, and it's an unreasonable for a [UK] agency to make demands from an exclusively [US] group under the assumption that they are aware of every possible law in existence. Someone in the [US] can't expect to have reasonable influence over the laws in the [UK] that they're now required to fol…

> under the assumption that they are aware of every possible law in existence That's why Ofcom started the correspondence, to inform 4chan of laws it may not have been aware of. > Someone in the [US] can't expect to have reasonable influence over the laws in the [UK] that they're now required to follow UK companies comply with US laws all the time if they want to continue serving US audiences. I wish this wasn't the…

> Sure they do. When I go to boards.4chan.org, the server recognises my request, including where it's coming from, and returns some content. Similarly, when I buy lemonade from a company, they see my shipping address and ships the lemonade. Seems to me like it maps pretty well.

How do you suspect a given IP address maps to a geographical location?

Does ofcom supply a list of IP addresses based in the UK? What if it's a US resident using a VPN or other anonymizing tool such as Tor?

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