EFF: Amended Version of FOSTA Would Still Silence Legitimate Speech Online
Amended Version of FOSTA Would Still Silence Legitimate Speech Online The House Judiciary Committee is about to decide whether to approve a new version [.pdf] of the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA, H.R. 1865 ), a bill that would force online platforms to police their users’ speech more closely. The new version of FOSTA improves a deeply problematic bill, but it still represents the same fundamentally flawed approach to fighting criminal activity online. Like the earlier version of FOSTA —and like SESTA ( S. 1693 ), its sibling bill in the Senate —the new version of FOSTA would do nothing to fight traffickers . What it would do is create more risk of criminal and civil liability for online platforms, resulting in them pushing legitimate voices offline. Closing Online Spaces Won’t End Trafficking Automated filters can be useful as an aid to transparent, human moderation, but when they’re given the final say over who can and can’t speak onli...