Mass EU Internet Censorship Laws to Be Quietly Ushered in on July 5th

New legislation will make sharing information online illegal in European Union

© press Members of the EU Parliament are due to pass new internet censorship laws on July 5th

The EU is due to pass draconian new laws on July 5th that will see an end to the free sharing of information on the internet.

Unelected members of the European Union Parliament are due to pass the new legislation this week that uses copyright law as a Trojan Horse into mass internet censorship.

Despite the ruling being made within the EU, the laws will have a global impact as internet companies change their policies to adhere to the controversial new bill.

To put it simply, once the "disastrous" law is ushered in, it will become illegal to share a link on Reddit, Facebook, or anywhere else, as sharing that link will infringe on the website's copyright, whether the website owner wants their posts to be shared or not.

© press Members of the EU Parliament prepare to usher in the new censorship laws

IWB reports: The EU politicians are either asleep at the wheel or under the control of dark forces, this sweeping new legislation will be used to censor to the Internet, effectively hand-cuffing the power of the people in their fight against the corrupt elite and psychopath-controlled corporations.

The plan is undemocratic, anyone based over in Europe should write to their MEPs before the vote on the 5th July and explain to them why it needs to be stopped.

Here is a link by which EU citizens can more easily contact their “representatives” on this matter: saveyourinternet.eu/.

According to the BBC, the approval of copyright bill vote is "Disastrous."

A committee of MEPs has voted to accept major changes to European copyright law, which experts say could change the nature of the internet.

They voted to approve the controversial Article 13, which critics warn could put an end to memes, remixes, and other user-generated content.

Article 11, requiring online platforms to pay publishers a fee if they link to their news content, was also approved.

One organization opposed the changes called it a "dark day."

The European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs voted by 15 votes to 10 to adopt Article 13 and by 13 votes to 12 to adopt Article 11.

It will now go to the wider European Parliament to vote on July 5th.

© press The EU Parliament is made up of unelected officials from each member state

Open Democracy reports: The EU has recently embarked on a new mission: controlling the Internet through the monopoly of copyright.

This attempt to reform and control the Internet has not received half the attention it deserves.

As Julia Reda, MEP for the Pirate Party has explained, the current project of EU legislation would impose automatic filters that control ANY content that anyone wants to upload.

The reason would be the protection of copyright, a monopoly right that primarily benefits large media behemoths, without any possibility of advance verification.

You read that right: the EU wants to put in place a global censorship machine, on the basis of unverifiable monopoly rights, mostly held by large media corporations.

According to KYM, Article 11 would require extra copyrights for news or media outlets, requiring anyone who would like to link to a news site must first get a license from the publisher.

Julia Reda writes:

“The automatic link previews social networks generate when users share links (showing the article headline, a thumbnail picture, and a short excerpt) would require a license, as well as anyone analyzing news content on the web like news aggregators, media monitoring services, and fact-checking services."

Article 13 requires that internet platforms that rely on hosting large amounts of user-uploaded data must monitor that content.

Additionally, they must moderate the content to identify copyright infringement.

The proposal could limit freedom of expression and harm independent creators.

On June 20th, the European Parliament Committee on Legal Affairs voted yes to on articles 11 and 13 of the referendum. Many criticized the vote stating that it “threatened the openness of the internet and made it less free.”

However, despite the vote, the vote does not put the rules into law, but rather only secures European Parliament’s position on the issue, before moving the process to the final stages.

On 20 June, the Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) voted for the Article 13 Censorship Machine.

But the battle has just begun: it must now be won in the European Parliament plenary. Contact your MEPs now!

If the EU signs this into law, they will have proved the Brexiteers right after all.