EU Ban on RU War Propaganda Misfires: Blocks Social Media Giants and Pirate IPTV
2 days ago
- #Propaganda
- #EU Sanctions
- #Internet Censorship
- EU issued broad sanctions against Russia post-2022 invasion, including bans on state-owned news outlets like Russia Today and Sputnik.
- Dutch ISP trade association NLconnect compiled an 'unofficial' blocklist by scraping lists from regulators in Germany, Austria, Estonia, Finland, and Lithuania.
- The NLconnect blocklist contains 796 domains, including social media platforms like ShareChat and Weibo, which may not be directly related to Russian propaganda.
- Some ISPs, like Ziggo, have implemented the blocklist, while others, like Freedom, reject it due to concerns over arbitrariness and overblocking.
- Lithuanian regulator LRTK's blocklist includes unrelated domains like torrent sites, raising questions about the criteria used for blocking.
- NLconnect emphasizes it is merely aggregating existing lists and directs questions about overblocking to the original regulators.
- Freedom ISP opts for a more selective approach, considering the German regulator BNetzA's list as more legally sound.
- Dutch regulator ACM clarifies its role is limited to net neutrality and does not oversee the execution or content of the sanctions list.