(libera.chat)
Libera.chat seems to say that even if Ofcom thinks they have a case, they don't as Libera's user base doesn't have enough UK users:
> The exact fraction of the UK’s online population that must use a given service to be considered “significant” is unknown, but based on our counsel’s observations of Ofcom’s previous regulatory actions, it appears to be much higher than our internal estimates of how large our UK user base is.
Related submission with 788 comments from ~1 week ago: "4Chan Lawyer publishes Ofcom correspondence" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45614148
their entire post is sophistry and wishful thinking, neither of which will work if ofcom decide to go after them
the intention of the OSA is to attempt to regulate user-to-user communications services, of which IRC is one
they're probably right that they're near bottom of the list though
(at least until this blog post ends up on their desk monday morning)
You're right in the sense that they can pursue whomever they want based on whatever interpretation of "significant" they may hold. But it is not Ofcom that ultimately decides on the meaning of the term, that is for a court to decide and that court would likely rely on the same authorities and principles that Libera's lawyers did in their advice.
assuming of course libera don't fold the moment they receive a nastygram ("enforcement notice")
like they did when andrew lee commandeered freenode
The problem is the law is worded in the vaguest way possible and ofcom in exceptionally bad faith have refused to give any clear guidance on what they will and won't prosecute. Our politicians in their arrogance have passed this law, so expect no help from them.
1. Arrest the founders or officers at the UK border if they attempt to enter.
2. Direct UK ISPs to block access to their services.
Let's see if they are so PR-insensitive that they will want to actually do that.
Case law is important in the UK because laws are vaguely written and thier specifics are established in court.
By going after entities that can't comply and don't have a big legal budget like 4chan, they can go through the motions and establish that ISP level blocks against non complying companies are okay.
They can then hit progressively more difficult targets until they get to X and tiktok.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK%E2%80%93US_extradition_trea...
1. Do you think that getting the legal advice was a good defensive measure?
(Something to point to, to establish that they were being responsible, if ever challenged.)
2. And do you think that publicizing it was a good idea?
(Probably they are drawing fire on Monday morning, like you said. But maybe it's a plausibly good tactical move because, just speculating here, someone now takes the time to pay attention to who they are, rather than them later land on some poorly-informed list of non-compliants that gets rubber-stamped for action.)
Interesting - this implies that the vast majority of niche communities are not considered to be in scope, so long as they're not on a service like Discord I guess.
It's just a variation of selective enforcement.
Some level of flexibility makes sense. That leaves room to enforce the intent instead of the technicalities.
However if its too broad, then you've basically thrown away rule of law. If everyone is arguably in violation but a government official decides who to enforce, esentially you just have justice by decree.
> For the time being, services like ours do not appear to be Ofcom’s priority.
Lawyers don't just tell you how the law is interpreted, but also how it's applied in practice. Often, bad law is worked around by the legal system rather than fixing it, and while one could rightfully lament this, if your goal is to get something done rather than fix the country's legal system... ask a lawyer and you might find yourself unblocked, or be told about a way to avoid the issue, or at least have a better understanding how big the risk is in practice, allowing you to make an informed decision.
That feels like a kinda "duh" thing? Even though the UK believes they can enforce this law abroad, if I were running a service outside of UK jurisdiction that would otherwise be subject to the Online Safety Act, I certainly wouldn't comply with it.
The crux of it was not that libera has no ties to the uk - they appearently do, allegedly some of their servers and staff are there - its that they have insufficient market penetration.
In an autocracy, you're at God's mercy.
I don't intend to ever travel to Russia or North Korea, but that's not some trivial anecdote about modern life, those are regimes so hostile to rule of law and individual safety that it's not reasonable to travel there.
What if there's a conference you want to go to, but it's in the UK? Or you have friends you want to visit? Or family, or whatever.
That's also an egregious degradation of the UK's position with regard to Western-norms around personal liberties, which itself is worthy of remark.
And now the UK joins the ranks as well. I should add that the US is also a member of this club if you’re foreign or you appear to be foreign, we are no paragon of virtue either.
Is this a Poe’s Law comment?
The UK on the other hand seems to have forgotten this basic, common approach to international relations and criminal jurisdiction, so if you work on any foreign technology or content that could be targeted by the UK government, it’s better to stay away.
(Yes I am aware that the US also doesn’t obey this principle, but that doesn’t make it right.)
I find it interesting how the shrinking of the world via the internet may result in more international isolation because of conflicting online laws.
Using cannabis is 100% illegal in every part of the US. The idea that it’s legal in some states is a common misconception, but not true.
If you forge Vietnamese money but you do it outside their border, they won’t arrest you if you go there because (from your other comment) “No country should have the right to enforce laws globally”?
This seems unlikely, and like you are cherry picking the UK because the example is digital and this is HN.
And, yes, there are some types of speech (libel, for instance) that merit special scrutiny. A web forum does not. It is literally just an online conversation—the very definition of protected speech.
For the UK to impose these restrictions within its own borders is already unacceptable. For them to play at imposing them on people in other countries is worse still. If they're serious about this, they should suck it up and proactively block websites from abroad that violate their guidelines. Vague threats of punishments without prior warning are ridiculous.
Whether that travel happens physically or digitally is of no concern to me.
I suppose you may make the argument that the internet is more like shipping a package than handing something over a counter to a traveler. I don’t think this applies. At most it’s like the customer sends a neutral intermediary to make a purchase/pickup, where that intermediary tells me nothing about the customer except a vague idea of their location (which may be inaccurate). In this case it’s the intermediary, or one of the many intermediaries in the chain, who actually “imports” the item.
If you want to block content, start there with the “importer”. China already understands this well, I don’t know why the UK hasn’t caught on other than a desire to force its own local standards on Americans. We won’t stand for it.
(Your example about forged currency is as absurd as an example about nuclear weapons or attempting to organize revolution. Yes, some things cross the threshold into a critical economic/military issue and all bets are off at that point.)
If they want to order ISPs to block services there needs to be some legal framework to do so. "We contacted them, they didn't respond, now we need to revert to blocking" sounds pretty convincing to me.
For your other argument I'll ask the question I ask anytime this comes up: How would you propose laws/regulations on online services are enforced if not (at least in principle) globally?
As well as "family friendly filters" that block rouge sites via their own DNS.
[0] https://www.blocked.org.uk/about
And if you're a person of interest your connection is routes through GCHQ Cheltenham.
So it wouldn't be to hard for Ofcom to apply a filter. If they did expect domestic ISPs will comply but hopefully independent ISPs won't.
I’m more afraid that anglosphere is showing the way for the rest of west-y world. Looking at chat control stuff and all that jazz, it’s matter of time same stuff becomes a thing in the rest „free“ world.
There are plenty of countries like that.
> but it's in the UK? Or you have friends you want to visit? Or family, or whatever.
Then yes, if on a individual level that affects you, you have to be careful. Like citizens of China or Russia, or Saudi Arabia. Welcome to the club, UK, I guess?
Genuine question.
There. Now I can't go to Thailand.
Why do people act like breaking British law is a bigger deal than breaking Thai law?
At least nobody's acting like it's obvious British law applies everywhere, like they tend to do with the GDPR.
Turns out, laws end at the limits of the jurisdiction's ability to enforce them! What a concept!
This would also probably help sway the public opinion in the UL to stop electing representatives that come up with laws like this - so a win either way.
https://www.ipsos.com/en-uk/britons-back-online-safety-acts-...
Middle England is conservative and authoritarian.
If you consider all we know about the excesses and influences of big tech companies, and then blunt that down to a more lay perspective, it's pretty easy to understand why we've landed up here.
People have lost faith in us.
That's a very powerful way to sum up what I've been feeling for a while.
People did lose faith, and to be honest, I can't really blame them. From a layman's perspective, it's not obvious that there's a distinction between "Big Tech" and other so-called "providers of services" (the term itself feels kind of icky) in the internet. Throw the "Tech Bro" term in there and things get even more difficult.
I'm guessing a lot of people never really knew about forums, chat communities and other things like that existing outside of the big social media companies' mostly-walled gardens. Maybe they heard some scary things about 4chan, well, that'll help.
To many of them, it's the little man vs. the big tech companies that skirted regulations for way too long. That there's a possible third party (or rather, category) involved is not obvious from the outside.
It’s the end of democracy in country X! The government’s taking away the people’s rights to x, y and z!
I mean, kinda, but it’s also hugely popular. Regular folks want their kids protected from some of this stuff, don’t believe that Silicon Valley and allied tech bros have their best interest at heart (and shouldn’t) and will readily vote for it.
Heck, I don’t have kids and I’m broadly in favour of the principle of keeping kids off social media, it’s just very hard to answer “what exactly do you mean by social media?” or “how are we going to do this without impacting adults’ ability to interact freely?”
Of course it's useful to have people like you make it about fake left v right tribalism so you don't realize how far from a democracy these parliamentary systems are.
[1] - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2023/50/section/55
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gilmore_(activist)#Activi...
The smaller companies like 4chan are going to court to have the matter settled. If that is settled in 4chan's favour, legally the UK won't be able to do anything.
The UK being blocked from the outside won't happen anyway. The large tech giants will just either cut a deal (this already happen with Apple/iCloud), or they will comply with the new acts. The sites that don't comply won't be big enough for anyone to care in normie land and thus there will be no real pressure on the UK gov.
You should do that as soon as possible. You don't escape past "violations" by dealing with them when they are discovered. Plus the presence of servers in the UK is easily enough for Ofcom to go after you, even if they ultimately lose their case. There's no benefit to keeping those UK servers.
> we can reasonably argue we do not have sufficient links to the UK for the Online Safety Act to be applicable to us.
> keeping internal estimates of our UK user base
The fact that you know you have UK users is also almost certainly enough for Ofcom to go after you. Did 4chan have any stronger links to the UK? I don't think so.
I'm not saying they should give in and follow the OSA but I think they're being pretty naive about how reasonable Ofcom is.
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/eu-age-ver...
It's a corporate lobbyst push and UK/Australia are just the canaries in the coalmine.
You won't escape it by being "they didn't quite come for me yet".
Libera.chat: an IRC network
LibreChat: an open-source chat application that supports multiple AI models and provides a UI similar to ChatGPT
I was only familiar with the latter, which is a very cool and useful project. Currently reading up on the prior.
It used to be as well known as HTTP. How times have changed.
UK should not be able to regulate nature of photons being sent from outside of their borders.
What am I missing?
Is it just me or is this not super confidence inspiring for what happens in the future? This just seems like an arbitrary time in future when they either have enough UK users or if Ofcom suddenly lowers or entirely removes the arbitrary "size" estimate, OSA will become applicable? As far as I can tell, we don't even know what this arbitrary "size" estimate is?
This kind of a memo is a useful CYA. An interpretation of the current situation and likely risk factors, and when the situation changes in the future, an artifact that justifies their current non-compliance. Will Ofcom/courts accept it and not require compliance if the situation changes? No, but it might eliminate or reduce penalties for non-compliance.
* At least reassures their users that they are doing their best, at least, even though that might not be much.
* Emphasizes the difficulty of the situation that the UK created.
* Shares, at least, a description of the advice they got (properly caveated that they or their lawyers weren’t giving anybody actual legal advice).