Google Executives on Trial for Posted Video
- 2
- Add a Comment
A trial in Italy of four Google executives has implications on internet security and privacy. This is a criminal trial, due to the nature of the video posted:
“…Prosecutors in Milan charge that the Google officials violated Italian privacy laws by allowing the posting of a cellphone video in 2006 that showed four youths taunting a student with learning disabilities.
The officials did not handle the posting directly, marking the first time that charges had been brought against representatives of a user-generated site for hosting an image without the subject’s express approval, prosecutors said.”
link: Google executives on trial in Italy
One of the issues is the responsibility for content. Are the Google executives directly responsible for posted content? Google continues to face the problem of local legislation being applied to a global organization. The varying national laws concerning privacy present Google with the near-impossible task of monitoring its massive video content.
Catherine Forsythe
[dogreader on Twitter]
2 Comments
Geoff Dunstan
February 6th, 2009
at 11:18am
Italians have always had a very strange sense of justice. Cruelty predominated in Rome 2000 years ago, now it seems mental retardation may play a part!
Kevin
February 9th, 2009
at 7:07pm
the only possible outcome of this kind of laws, if the court rules against Google, would be Google blocking Italian IPs from posting videos.