Speech police The global struggle to govern the Internet

David Kaye

Book - 2019

"The internet was designed to be a kind of free-speech paradise, but a lot of the material on it turned out to incite violence, spread untruth, and promote hate. Over the years, three American behemoths--Facebook, YouTube and Twitter--became the way most of the world experiences the internet, and therefore the conveyors of much of its disturbing material. What should be done about this enormous problem? Should the giant social media platforms police the content themselves, as is the norm in the U.S., or should governments and international organizations regulate the internet, as is the call in parts of Europe? How do we keep from helping authoritarian regimes to censor all criticisms of themselves? David Kaye, who serves as the United ...Nations' special rapporteur on free expression, has been at the center of the discussions of these issues for years. He takes us behind the scenes, from Facebook's "mini-legislative" meetings, to the European Commission's closed-door negotiations, and introduces us to journalists, activists, and content moderators whose stories bring clarity and urgency to the topic of censorship. Speech Police is the most comprehensive and insightful treatment of the subject thus far, and reminds us of the importance of maintaining the internet's original commitment to free speech, free of any company's or government's absolute control, while finding ways to modulate its worst aspects." -- from publisher's web site.

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Subjects
Published
New York : Columbia Global Reports [2019]
Language
English
Main Author
David Kaye (author)
Physical Description
142 pages : map ; 19 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 135-142).
ISBN
9780999745489
  • 1. Platform power
  • 2. The Internet comes to Washington
  • 3. Humans and machines
  • 4. Wir schaffen das!
  • 5. Choose your side
  • 6. "Arbiters of truth"
  • 7. The challenge of the "partly free"
  • Conclusion : policing speech in a centralizing Internet.
Review by Library Journal Review

Kaye, United Nations Special Rapporteur and regular contributor to many publications, has produced a brief yet impactful work about the Internet and efforts to control such expressions as hate speech and advocacy of terrorism. Kaye analyzes several examples of how online content producers are targeted for varied reasons, how platforms such as YouTube and Facebook have attempted to police forms of content on their servers, and how the culture of responsibility for Internet governance has shifted in the past last years. Kaye also covers fake news and the increased efforts by platforms such as Twitter and Facebook to root out these posts via automation--specifically AI. At the same time, Kaye brilliantly layers analysis of the politicization of content on platforms and the growth of efforts, mostly in Europe, to regulate these private, mostly American companies. All the while, Kaye makes sure readers are aware of the complexities and how free speech may be embattled if some of these regulations are put into effect at scale. VERDICT Insightful for readers who have tracked the history of expression on the Internet and who enjoy connecting that history to law and culture.--Jesse A. Lambertson, Georgetown Univ. Libs.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

Policing the internet is necessary, but which entity shall we entrust with doing that work?Governments fear a decentralized internet, but individuals should be alarmed about the centralization that has been firming up, "dominated by the corporate imperatives of advertising and data mining." So writes Kaye (Law/Univ. of California, Irvine), the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, in this lucid exploration of the internet, which has become the domain of media and commercial monopolies instead of the earlier one in which numerous individual bloggers and publications were influential. Owned by Google, YouTube, for instance, has no incentive to clean up posts that fuel discord and hatred. Nor does Facebook: "There is no denying that they make a lot of money from a model that serves up video after video, or post after post, that takes one further and further away from verifiable information and toward the clickbait world of disinformation that intends to meaningfully deceive an audience." Instead, it is in the corporate interest to hide behind claims of free speech that until recently sheltered the likes of Milo Yiannopoulos and Alex Jones. Entities such as the European Union and the U.N. are now pressing companies to police such speech under penalty of heavy fines, with legitimate information at risk of being cast away along with hate speech. Kaye proposes the application of human rights law to address some of these concerns, and he advocates better transparency and accountability as well as civilian oversight and democratic governance, since "whoever is in charge will have massive power over the future of civic space and freedom of expression worldwide." Usefully, the author draws on examples from around the world, especially places where access to information is a literal matter of life and death, such as Syria and Myanmar. While corporate dominance is an undeniable threat to free speech for its own sake, he also observes, provocatively, that "fighting disinformation begins with governments telling the truth."An essential contribution to the discussion of free speech and its online enemies. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.