Appeal for a suspension on new Italian Internet rules, since an Italian Parliament decision on copyright and constitutional rights balance will take place. Association of Italian Consumers and Majors associations of small-medium businesses companies against automatic deletion of sites on the internet | Fulog

ADICONSUM, and ALTROCONSUMO, two of the largest associations of Italian consumers, ASSOPROVIDER-Confcommercio, ASSONET-Confesercenti, two of the most important associations of small-medium businesses companies, AGORA ‘DIGITALE, Association for Freedom of Netizens , and Sarzana & Partners Law Firm, against automatic deletion of sites on the Internet by the Italian Authority for Communications

From 3 March the Italian’s Authority for Communications may remove content at its discretion and sites on the Internet without going through a court and without which the Parliament was never consulted.

Hundreds of websites, information sources, online magazines, simple blog may be subject to censorship by the mere suspicion of having breached in any way the copyright.

Disappear from the internet thousands of videos, photos and documents uploaded by users in sharing networks.

The sites also from abroad, from online magazines to private sites, suspected of possessing even a single file that infringes the copyright, will be inhibited to Italian users who will be a page that says “site unreachable” without know why.

To say no to this complaint and to ask Parliament, the only legitimate body to decide on fundamental rights of individuals to take action, will take place an information campaign called www.sitononraggiungibile.it ( i.e. Site not found in italian) promoted among others by ADICONSUM, Altroconsumo, ASSOPROVIDER-Confcommercio, Assonet-Confesercenti, AGORA ‘Digital, which will allow all citizens to sign a petition addressed to the Parliament to stop the approval of new rules by the Authority for Communications..

This is the text of open letter to Parliament.

To The Member of Italian Parliament

To The Italian Communication Authority (AGCOM)

Appeal for a suspension on new Italian Internet rules, since an Italian Parliament decision on copyright and constitutional rights balance will take place.

Dear sirs,
Imagine that one day, entire sections of your library will not be accessible anymore.

None will write you which specific books and why they were removed, but you only get an advice informing you that someone, somewhere, for some reason, reported that books in that section violate someone rights

Do you think this will not happen in a modern western Democracy?

Without a digital network copyright regulation, providing a balance between different interests in society, as an instrument of emancipation for content producers, this scenario will become soon a pervasive system of control and censorship . in Italy

In fact, with December 2010 668/2010 Italian Communications Regulatory Authority Resolution (without any previous Parliament debate) this Authority introduces a consultation on a text that aims to establish a mechanism which allows to completely inhibit the accessibility of sites located outside the Italian territory and to remove content suspected infringing the copyright in an automatic way , and without reference to any Judiciary Court requirement .

Italy will be the first western Country to have a regulation that can prevent citizen Internet contents access without any previous Italian Parliament debate on copyright and digital rights.

The “library” sections interested to this ‘Internet access denied’ could include foreign portals suspected of copyright infringment, most common systems to access information necessary for free software and public domain openly licensed documents exchange.

The individual “books” removed include articles from journals, government and privatedatabase, confidential documents and usefull facts that public might not know otherwise, home videos and photos with music uploaded in sharing platforms, blog individual pages containing even a single file in violation of copyright.

To avoid t this will occur in the general silence, we ask the >Italian Communications Authority to suspend any kind of new copyright regulation .

No new rules should be adopted until an Italian Parliament wide debate, opened to citizens to define a new balance between copyright and constitutional rights.

We ask this because we know which could be the effects of a regulation introduced without a proper assessment of its impact , and how far these effects could be from an unreliable forecast.

We also substain it’s dangerous that any Authority regulates matters that the Italian Constitution entrusts the legislative and judiciary powers, matters have longly been debated by Parliaments in other countries, or finally, as is often the case with Internet regulation, matters that have seen a ‘ self-regulation process’ within the perimeters that the traditional laws allow.

We ask all Italian political parties representatives that Parliament returns to be the place of a debate involving all Internet actors, eventually involving international skilled people.

This way it will be obtained the result to give back to the Italian Parliament its interlocution role with civil society, and to re-establish the respect of the Separation of Powers in Italy.

Signed

ADICONSUM,

ALTROCONSUMO,

ASSOPROVIDER-Confcommercio,

ASSONET-Confesercenti,

AGORA’ DIGITALE,

STUDIO LEGALE SARZANA