[Chapter-delegates] European Commission - Final report of the High Level Expert Group on Fake News and Online Disinformation

[Veni Markovski]

Dear colleagues,
I am privileged* to point you to you the Final report of the High Level
Expert Group on Fake News and Online Disinformation
<https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/news/final-report-high-level-expert-group-fake-news-and-online-disinformation>.
(also attached)

/"The analysis presented in the Report starts from a shared
understanding of disinformation as a phenomenon that goes well beyond
the term "fake news". Disinformation as defined in this Report includes
all forms of false, inaccurate, or misleading information designed,
presented and promoted to intentionally cause public harm or for profit.
It does not cover issues arising from the creation and dissemination
online of illegal content (notably defamation, hate speech, incitement
to violence), which are subject to regulatory remedies under EU or
national laws, nor other forms of deliberate but not misleading
distortions of facts such a satire and parody."/

From the point of view of ISOC chapters, and the broader i* technical
community there are couple of moments, which are very important. They
are related to what advice the group gave to the European Commission
with regards to their further actions.

/As the the Executive Summary says (page 5), //"the HLEG advises the
Commission to disregard simplistic solutions. Any form of censorship
either public or private should clearly be avoided. Fragmentation of the
Internet, or any harmful consequences for its technical functioning
should also be avoided."////
//In the report itself (page 20), I'd like to draw your attention to
these lines, "The HLEG believes the best responses are likely to be
those driven by Multistakeholder collaborations, minimize legal
regulatory interventions, and avoid the politically dictated
privatization of the policing and censorship of what is and is not
acceptable forms of expression. They should be based on clearly defined
principles established through a transparent multistakeholder engagement
process and framed within a binding roadmap for implementation including
monitoring and reporting requirements in order to make them effective in
practise. These responses, by all stakeholders, should not lead to
harmful consequences for the technical functioning of the Internet;
among others, they should avoid its fragmentation, and ensure that its
security, stability and resiliency is intact."/


In the context of the search for the new President/CEO of ISOC, it may
be good to point out that whoever she or he is, and I speak here as
chairman of the board of an European chapter (ISOC-Bulgaria, est. 1995),
I would be expecting that s/he would enhance the relations between ISOC
and the European Union. We've discussed this idea some years ago in one
of the lists - that ISOC could engage more, and could even get some
funding from the EU, which might help the global ISOC to solve some of
the issues, related to disproportionate funds, coming only from one
source (PIR/.org).

Also, it should be clear by now that the EU and the European Commission
will continue to engage in issues, related to the Internet, including to
issues that are within the scope of activities of ISOC. Their studies,
projects, not even mentioning the policies, legislation, communications,
etc., might have a serious impact on the development of the Internet
globally. We all see how one European legislation - the GDPR - has an
impact on almost every Internet user, around the planet. IMHO, ISOC
should be more actively engaged in the discussions and deliberations,
leading to such policies. ISOC chapters in certain countries are engaged
(I can give Bulgaria as an obvious example!), but in others they are not
so much. There should be a better coordination between the chapters,
with the help of ISOC, in order to make sure that no harm is going to be
done to the global Internet.

-- 

Best regards, 
Veni
http://www.isoc.bg
Internet Society - Bulgaria 
pgp:5BA1366E veni at veni.com


_____
* - I say "privileged", because I was one of the 39 experts - members of this group. 
I participated in my personal capacity, as an expert from Bulgaria. 

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