The undersigned, working to defend human and consumer rights around the world, express their deep concern regarding the European Commission's proposal to require Internet platforms to use automated upload filtering technologies. This legislative proposal also includes measures to weaken the current intermediary liability protections in European law. Although the proposal is contained in draft legislation on copyright in Europe, the impact will inevitably be felt in every policy area and will impact negative
In effect, the proposed upload filter obligation will build a system where citizens will face Internet platforms blocking the upload of their content, even if it is a perfectly legal use of copyrighted content.
This is an affront to the rule of law and freedom of expression. Logically, the computer programs used for filtering will be designed to ensure minimum risk and liability for those platforms. These programs cannot understand the functioning of crucial copyright exceptions that are implemented to support, just to name a few, education, parody, free speech and quotation. The European Commission's proposal places excessive power in the hands of copyright owners, despite many examples of past abuses of such pow