CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2019
| Author | Nesic, Milica |
|---|---|
| Title | Online Hate Speech: Against Strict Internet Intermediaries' Liability as a Solution for Ensuring Victim's Protection |
| Summary | As a response to online hate speech, countries started introducing strict liability regime for Internet Intermediaries who host third-party content. In the recent years, this trend of obliging Internet Intermediaries to monitor all the content they host in order to expeditiously delete illegal one, has started spreading especially among European countries. The thesis analyzes the strict liability regime imposed to Internet Intermediaries for third-party content in the cases of online hate speech, by presenting solutions adopted recently by ECtHR and Germany. At the same time, it makes parallel to the Indian solution, where broad immunity regime was introduced, making Internet Intermediaries liable only in case they fail to obey a court order. Seeking to provide an answer to the question whether imposing strict liability to Internet Intermediaries is a proper way of combating online hate speech, the thesis’ major finding concludes that Internet Intermediaries, as private actors, should not be imposed with such type of liability, especially not in the cases of online hate speech. This regime undermines freedom of expression and introduces high level of censorship, since Internet Intermediaries, as private actors lacking legal knowledge and afraid of being punished, often err and delete content out of caution, especially when deciding about alleged hate speech content. At the same time, strict liability regime represents an excessive burden for Internet Intermediaries, since it requires additional resources and enormous personnel in order to pre-screen entire third-party content. Additionally, it endangers third-parties due process rights and privacy rights. By explaining all the negative implications of strict liability regime through comparative analysis of different legal solutions, the thesis in a systematic manner calls upon the states to refrain themselves from imposing this type of liability to Internet Intermediaries. |
| Supervisor | Sajo, Andras |
| Department | Legal Studies LLM |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2019/nesic_milica.pdf |
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