"Trolling" - A Critical Discussion......

[accessory]

http://www.bbc.co.uk...nology-18404621

Websites to be forced to identify trolls under new measures

Websites will soon to be forced to identify people who have posted defamatory messages online.

New government proposals say victims have a right to know who is behind malicious messages without the need for costly legal battles.

The powers will be balanced by measures to prevent false claims in order to get material removed.

Last week, a British woman won a court order forcing Facebook to identify users who had harassed her.

Nicola Brookes had been falsely branded a paedophile and drug dealer by users - known as trolls - on Facebook.

Facebook, which did not contest the order, will now reveal the IP addresses of people who had abused her so she can prosecute them.

The new powers, to be added to the Defamation Bill, will make this process far less time-consuming and costly, the government said.

Complying with requests would afford the website greater protection from being sued in the event of a defamation claim.

Currently, in legal terms, every website "hit" - visit - on a defamatory article can be counted as a separate offence.

This means many websites remove articles as soon as a defamation claim is made - either rightly or wrongly.

"Website operators are in principle liable as publishers for everything that appears on their sites, even though the content is often determined by users," said Justice Secretary Ken Clarke.

"But most operators are not in a position to know whether the material posted is defamatory or not and very often - faced with a complaint - they will immediately remove material.

"Our proposed approach will mean that website operators have a defence against libel as long as they identify the authors of allegedly defamatory material when requested to do so by a complainant."

Mr Clarke said the measures would mean an end to "scurrilous rumour and allegation" being posted online without fear of adequate punishment.

"The government wants a libel regime for the internet that makes it possible for people to protect their reputations effectively but also ensures that information online can't be easily censored by casual threats of litigation against website operators.

"It will be very important to ensure that these measures do not inadvertently expose genuine whistleblowers, and we are committed to getting the detail right to minimise this risk."

[Rincewind]

A couple of suggestions. Either have administrators required to have a little knowledge of the libel laws or have a website free or low cost where some one with the right qualifications can observe the postings of the alledged trolls for a short while to determine how serious the situation is.

Saying that this site seems to be pretty well 'policed' so we see little of trolls.

[ithuriel]

Pretty well policed , this site is so full of trollyness, bad language and terrible attitudes i'm surprised there has not been a death video made similar to the ring for peeps to send to each other though i get the feeling some peeps might be working on that

Even have my own personnal troll, i feel loved

[Finnegan]

Pretty well policed , this site is so full of trollyness, bad language and terrible attitudes i'm surprised there has not been a death video made similar to the ring for peeps to send to each other though i get the feeling some peeps might be working on that

Even have my own personnal troll, i feel loved

This place doesn't have "trolls" in the sense that this law is out to stop. There are incidents of severe internet bullying that have lead to suicides and real life violence. Foxes Talk just has a few wind-up merchants.

Plus, given that most of the main offenders on here have all met each other, Facebooked each other and all mostly live in the same city (or visit the same stadiums regularly) there's not a lot of anonymity. Anyone trying hard enough could work out who most of the "old guard" on this board are without the need for IP addresses or whatever.

We like to accuse each other of "hiding behind the keyboard" but most of the people on here with a big enough post count are accountable enough.

[Guest]

I think there's now a confusion about what a "TROLL" is. The government think that they are trendy using terms like that but they really have no idea.

Can somone confirm is this covers sites that work under a password for members system?

Reallyopening up a can of worms though the principle idea is okay.

[Captain...]

Like the e-warrant, it will be so easy to get round, if you want to troll someone on facebook, you wouldn't use your real account you would just set-up another account through a proxy and use the proxy to log in and abuse away.

In some ways it is another form of censorship, I can see this being used in situations like the Ryan Giggs "super injunction", which I disagree with, celebrities shouldn't be able to buy discretion, and in cases like the people who revealed the victim in the Ched Evans rape case, which I do agree with.

But as always those that will get caught will be the stupid ones, who don't really know what they are doing, the ones that will cause the real damage will never get caught because it is so easy to get round.

[ADK]

I don't think its pathetic to mourn the death of someone you didnt know personally.

Also however, i don't think you should be arrested for posting things on the internet.

[Captain...]

I don't think its pathetic to mourn the death of someone you didnt know personally.

Also however, i don't think you should be arrested for posting things on the internet.

Depends what you post, if I post someone's home address and that they are a kiddy fiddler with some doctored photos of them touching children then someone goes round and burns their house down, should I not be arrested for that?

Edit: and it as all a lie.

[ADK]

Depends what you post, if I post someone's home address and that they are a kiddy fiddler with some doctored photos of them touching children then someone goes round and burns their house down, should I not be arrested for that?

Edit: and it as all a lie.

Should you be arrested if nobody burns their house down?

[Captain...]

Should you be arrested if nobody burns their house down?

Depends how convincing a job I have done, and whether it was clearly an attempt to damage someone's reputation and cause harm to come to them, and whether that attempt can be classed as successful.

For example the incident with the EDL guy who said someone was fit for a muslim, she responded, incorrectly, that she was 15 and called him a peado, clearly nobody would read that and actually think he was.

Whereas some professionally doctored pictures of somebody making it look like someone was being inappropriate with minors is, even nothing comes of it, potentially very damaging to somebody's reputation.

[ADK]

Depends how convincing a job I have done, and whether it was clearly an attempt to damage someone's reputation and cause harm to come to them, and whether that attempt can be classed as successful.

For example the incident with the EDL guy who said someone was fit for a muslim, she responded, incorrectly, that she was 15 and called him a peado, clearly nobody would read that and actually think he was.

Whereas some professionally doctored pictures of somebody making it look like someone was being inappropriate with minors is, even nothing comes of it, potentially very damaging to somebody's reputation.

Where the internet is being used to harrass someone then fair enough.

I am more thinking of the cases of people being arrested for posting things on their own blog/twitter/facebook