The French courts have finally clamped down on the local version of social media platform Twitter where a number of racist, anti-Semitic and homophobic hashtags have been doing the rounds. Although Twitter itself under pressure from advocacy groups has shut down accounts of such users but it has so far refused to identify and name the perpetrators.
However, the Union of Jewish Students (UEJF), which earlier pressurised Twitter to close the offending accounts, went to court to force Twitter into revealing the names. The Grand Instance Court agreeing with the arguments forwarded by the UEJF ruled that Twitter must identify the people behind the racist tweets.
It also urged the social media platform to create an easy mechanism for French security authorities to identify illegal content so that they can take action against the law breakers. Twitter now has two weeks to comply with the request or face € 1,000 in fines each day they fail to implement the court’s order.
Twitter’s hesitation to reveal the names stems from the right to free speech in America where the company is based. According to U.S laws all speech is protected even the most hateful with the line drawn at incitement to violence.
Sacha Reingewirtz, UEJF’s vice president, speaking to French Radio, RFI, said:
“We’ve already tweeted the decision. And we see on Twitter that the decision has apparently triggered a new rise of anti-semitic messages directed against our organization, so there is still work to be done, both by us and Twitter, but we’re happy the French justice is now changing the way it is.”
It remains to be seen when Twitter responds to the decision made by the French court.
Source: Arstechnica
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