Hi all!
The European Parliament is off on its summer break and won’t be back until
the end of August. Other institutions are also winding down for the next
few weeks. Here’s a last update of what was achieved in the last weeks and
where we will pick up in September.
Dimi & Michele
=== EMFA ===
Some updates concerning the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), which is an
attempt to foster pluralism and journalistic independence across the EU.
Council adopted its general approach
<https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-10954-2023-INIT/en/pdf>
last June, Parliament is actively working to swiftly adopt its position
(the vote in plenary should take place in October). The Internal Market
Committee
<https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/IMCO-AD-742456_EN.pdf> (IMCO
has shared competence on the whole text) and Civil Liberties Committees
<https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2014_2019/plmrep/COMMITTEES/LIBE/DV…>
(LIBE has exclusive competence on Articles 4(2) and 20(3)) adopted their
respective opinions. On 18 July, shadow rapporteurs in the Culture and
Education Committee (CULT is the lead committee) struck a deal on the text
<https://politico-uploads-production.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/editorial_do…>
and agreed to maintain the original schedule of the vote, which is foreseen
for the next 7th of September.
—
The focus of our attention is on Article 17 of the proposal that aims at
introducing the so-called "media exemption". The different political groups
tabled several amendments and some had the result to include Wikipedia
within the scope of this Article by deleting the reference to "online
intermediation services" or adding a reference to DSA provisions. We
informed lawmakers of the effect of their changes and a clarification was
added in a recital which shadow rapporteurs agreed to include it. At the
end of August, there will be a technical meeting to formalise all recitals
including the one containing the carveout. Of course, the original
definition, as proposed by the Commission and the Council, remains our main
preference. We hope this recital remains a secondary safety net.
—
In addition, we signed two letters addressed to the LIBE Committee MEPs
asking for a complete ban on the possible use of spyware against
journalists (you may find them here
<https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Open-Letter-Council-Protection-…>
and here
<https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Letter-to-MEPs-before-LIBE-vote…>
).
—
If Parliament manages to adopt its position in October, as it seems the
case, trilogue negotiations will start immediately after. The goal of
lawmakers isto approve the new law before the end of the term and ahead of
European elections that will take place in June 2024.
=== Political Advertising Regulation ===
Negotiations on this important piece of legislation
<https://oeil.secure.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?refere…>,
that aims to frame clear rules for political advertising online across the
block, have been halted given that Parliament and Council could not find an
agreement on the use of sensitive data in targeting and micro-targeting
techniques. The Spanish Presidency seems not ready to resume negotiations
immediately despite its position being closer to the one of Parliament.
Speculations suggest that negotiations will restart only in October. It is
therefore unclear if the new regulation will be adopted before the end of
the term and will be applied during the 2024 EU elections.
—
Wikimedia projects should be safely out of scope of this file, but this can
sometimes quickly change as lawmakers make edits to the definitions.
Wikimedia also cares about privacy and worries about the tracking of users
online. These are the two aspects we concentrate on within this file.
=== SLAPP Case Against Wikipedia in Portugal ===
In an ongoing lawsuit, the court in Portugal ordered the Wikimedia
Foundation to delete
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/07/27/high-stakes-for-the-wikimedia-project…>
well-sourced, publicly available and relevant information about a notable
person, and to disclose user data. We believe this is a so-called SLAPP
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation>
case and incompatible with EU law, including the Digital Services Act
currently being implemented.g. The Wikimedia Foundation is appealing and
hasn’t provided any data in this case.
—
The European Union is currently debating a proposed “anti-SLAPP Directive”
- full title Directive on protecting persons who engage in public
participation from manifestly unfounded or abusive court proceedings
<https://oeil.secure.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?refere…>
.
—
We are making sure that lawmakers involved in these procedures are aware of
of the Portuguese case, as well as the case involving User:Kruusamägi in
Estonia
<https://news.err.ee/1608852323/businessman-wikipedia-must-be-responsible-fo…>
.
=== France’s Tech Bill Regulating The Online Environment ===
France is working on a tech bill to regulate the entire online environment.
More precisely the projet de loi visant à sécuriser et réguler l’espace
numérique (SREN) <https://www.senat.fr/dossier-legislatif/pjl22-593.html>.
—
There are several problematic articles and aspects in the proposal that
would change how content moderation on our projects works. Such examples
are provisions aiming to keep links to “banned” media off websites (think
Russia Today) or an obligation to not allow banned users from
re-registering (which would require some sort of background check on all
new registrations).
—
Wikimédia France, Wikimedia Europe and the Wikimedia Foundation are
coordinating on this. We are also checking in with like-minded
organisations and other online projects and exploring possible
collaborations. The French legislator will resume its activities in
September.
=== Summer Reading: Italy Crusade Against the Public Domain ===
Recently the Republic of Italy is going out of its way to restrict and get
paid for re-use of public domain material. As any good tale, the stories
are scary and silly at the same time. We recommend this post by Deborah De
Angelis and Giuditta Giardini
<https://communia-association.org/2023/07/10/tales-of-public-domain-protecti…>,
as well as the case-specific articles about The Uffizi vs. Jean Paul
Gaultier
<https://communia-association.org/2022/10/25/the-uffizi-vs-jean-paul-gaultie…>
and The Vitruvian Man & Ravensburger puzzles
<https://communia-association.org/2023/03/01/the-vitruvian-man-a-puzzling-ca…>
.
--
Wikimedia Europe ivzw
Dear Friends,
We wish to bring your attention to important developments in Portugal.
We are concerned that an ongoing lawsuit against the Wikimedia Foundation in Portugal may be a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) designed to suppress well-sourced public information.
To summarize, the court has so far ordered the Foundation to delete information from articles about the notable person who is suing us, and to identify the Wikipedians who added the content. The case could end up with a ruling that punishes individuals simply for summarizing and publishing on Wikipedia what was said about a notable person in news media. If a volunteer editor who works on an article can become liable for everything that is in the article, contributing to Wikipedia will become much more difficult not only in Portugal, but potentially elsewhere as well. This would have an undue chilling effect on freedom of expression and information worldwide.
We want to assure you that we are fighting this case for two reasons: 1) to protect the user data of volunteers contributing to political biographies; and, 2) to set an important precedent protecting the ability to write biographies of living persons. In the process, the Foundation has not provided any user data in this case. We are hopeful that the courts will agree with us on the importance of protecting freedom of information and good-faith discussion of public interest topics.
You can learn more about the details of the case and what it could mean for Wikimedia projects and volunteers in this blog post [1].
All the best,
Ziski & WMF Global Advocacy Team
-----
[1] https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/07/27/high-stakes-for-the-wikimedia-project…