The Official Fake News

http://www.counterpunch.org/2018/07/03/the-official-fake-news/
Date Written:  2018-07-03
Publisher:  CounterPunch
Year Published:  2018
Resource Type:  Article
Cx Number:  CX22775

Emmanuel Macron, who was comfortably elected to the presidency, has instructed his parliamentary majority to provide him with a law against 'fake news' during election campaigns. The law would be a selective halt to the the dissemination of information with dangerous consequences.

Abstract: 
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Excerpt:

Macron has a similar obsession, to the point of hoping to make fake news vanish with a law that is both useless and dangerous. Useless because France's Council of State pointed out on 19 April that 'French law already contains several measures intended to combat the dissemination of false information’: in particular the law of 29 July 1881 on the freedom of the press, which permits curbs on the dissemination of false information and the expression of views that are defamatory or abusive or incite hatred.

And dangerous because the bill about to go before parliament would require a judge to act within 48 hours to stop the artificial and large-scale dissemination of news constituting false information.' But, the Council of State's response continued, 'these are hard to determine legally, especially when the judge must give a judgement within a very short time.' Macron’s law would also strengthen Internet service providers' and hosts' duty of cooperation with the authorities, since it extends to all false information restraints that were initially aimed at preventing ‘apologism for crimes against humanity, incitement to hatred and child pornography.'