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Posted by giuliomagnifico 1 day ago

Anti-cybercrime laws are being weaponized to repress journalism(www.cjr.org)
325 points | 94 commentspage 2
kristjank 1 day ago|
>Well meaning

yeah, right

terminalshort 1 day ago||
> Across the world, well-meaning laws intended to reduce online fraud and other scourges of the internet are being put to a very different use.

If only someone, anyone, could have foreseen this /s. I read so many HN comments about the "slippery slope fallacy," back when the powers that be were censoring the people that they didn't like. I bet they'll be right back where they were next time the government is going after the "misinformation" they don't like.

ThrowawayTestr 1 day ago|
Everyone is an authoritarian towards the other side.
hunterpayne 1 day ago||
No, not everyone is like that. But plenty of people are.
gxs 1 day ago||
> One provision in particular—Section 24, which made it illegal to publish false information online that was deemed to be “grossly offensive,” “indecent,” or even merely an “annoyance”—has been especially ripe for abuse

I mean how is this surprising to anyone?

Grossly offensive is in the eye of the beholder

hunterpayne 1 day ago|
> Grossly offensive is in the eye of the beholder

Quite right. However, certain media outlets have knowingly published false information and when pushed on this they claim that those reports happened as part of the "opinion" part of their reporting. Before you get smug, your side does it too (as does mine). I'm am less concerned with blaming people than coming up with a mitigation of these issues.

So I think we need a 2 class system of reporting. A factual part where knowingly reporting false information has consequences. And an opinion part where it doesn't. Journalists would claim they already do this but here is the new policy. Reporting must constantly and clearly show to which class the report belongs. So maybe a change in background color on websites, or a change in the frame color for videos. Something that make it visually and immediately clear to which class this reporting belongs. That way people can more accurately assess the level of credibility the reporting should have.

gxs 1 day ago||
In a different time when different mindsets prevailed, the US government handled this about as well as you could hope

The Fairness Doctrine is irrelevant today because of the way news is published/broadcast, but was effective in my humble opinion

From Wikipedia: “ The fairness doctrine had two basic elements: It required broadcasters to devote some of their airtime to discussing controversial matters of public interest, and to air contrasting views regarding those matters.”

And without getting too political, the beginning of a lot of our media woes in terms of news correlates nicely with when the doctrine was revoked

hsuduebc2 1 day ago||
Any instrument that can be used to repress opposition should be minimal, transparent, and tightly limited if it must exist at all. When power gets new levers, it always finds new ways to pull them.

But in this case it may be designed for that purpose.

taccal 1 day ago||
[dead]
SilverElfin 1 day ago||
What’s the principled line between journalism and crime, if there is one that isn’t just opinion? Often journalists are not just protecting sources but guiding them or encouraging them. And those sources are sometimes committing crimes like leaking trade secrets or other confidential info.
croes 1 day ago||
> Often journalists are not just protecting sources but guiding them or encouraging them.

Source?

burningChrome 1 day ago||
The Rolling Stone scandal around "A Rape On Campus" article is a good example:

Rolling Stone’s investigation: ‘A failure that was avoidable’: https://www.cjr.org/investigation/rolling_stone_investigatio...

Last July 8, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, a writer for Rolling Stone, telephoned Emily Renda, a rape survivor working on sexual assault issues as a staff member at the University of Virginia. Erdely said she was searching for a single, emblematic college rape case that would show “what it’s like to be on campus now … where not only is rape so prevalent but also that there’s this pervasive culture of sexual harassment/rape culture,” according to Erdely’s notes of the conversation"

FrustratedMonky 1 day ago|||
So cajoling is a crime?
terminalshort 1 day ago|||
Thankfully, no. But from reading comments on the internet it seems like "look what you made me do" is considered a valid excuse by a large percentage of so called adults in the US.
ThrowawayTestr 1 day ago|||
Incitement of violence is a crime
BolexNOLA 1 day ago||
> And those sources are sometimes committing crimes like leaking trade secrets or other confidential info

I mean this with all sincerity: So what? What bearing does that have on the journalist and what they are writing?

I am also curious about that claim the other guy asked you about, “Guiding” sources and such.

SilverElfin 1 day ago||
I know it directly from first hand experience. And I liken it to jurisprudence on incitement to violence. Is incitement to theft also punishable? Does the motivation being journalism matter? Why or why not?
malcolmgreaves 1 day ago|||
Journalists provide a valuable public service: publishing the truth. The position you’re advocating for is sullied up as “fuck the truth, bend the knee to the law.” Your opinion is incompatible with a free society.
BolexNOLA 1 day ago|||
Hold on, who said a journalist was inciting criminal activity? That is a completely different animal. Of course I am not saying that’s fine. That’s not even remotely what I’m talking about.
zkmon 1 day ago|
Laws by definition are capsules of power. Some laws give more power to government and some laws give power to some sections of people, such as gender-based or cast-based laws, renter-vs-landlord rules etc. Such laws are easy to be weaponized by the party whom the law favors. Such laws actually increase crime through fake cases. In some Western countries, teen gangs create so much terror, only because they are immune to punishment by law.