French Court Orders ISPs To Block Gambling Websites
from the hello,-censorship dept
While there's a lot of attention being paid to the French "three strikes law," and the organization, Hadopi, that is planning a system for implementing it, it appears that another form of internet censorship is happening via the courts in France. Reader JJ sends over the news that ISPs in France are being ordered to block access to certain "unauthorized" gambling websites. The country's gambling regulator, Arjel, ordered the ISPs to block certain gambling sites, and after a court battle, it appears Arjel has won. Effectively, the court has ruled that the French government can order ISPs to censor the internet, which seems like the sort of story that should be getting more attention.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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move to a more democratic country
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The UK-based (actually mostly Gibraltar-based) online casinos have a relatively small footprint in the French market anyway. My company's implementing the block today, and we doubt anybody will really notice outside of a handful of regular customers. Those companies actually targeting the French market (mainly based in Malta) will probably already have licences.
If you're talking about the implications for free speech, the French have always had their own way of doing things and I doubt that a block on unlicensed entities in an already heavily regulated industry will make much difference to any of the countries you mention. At the end of the day, this is simply the French being the French and doing things their way. It's a little silly, but it won't affect the rest of the world.
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just because its on the net doesnt make make some holy site that no country can regulate or block
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WOW
just because its on the net doesnt make make some holy site that no country can regulate or block"
lol... as if blocking them will do anything. With all this blocking and censorship, it's only a matter of time before the average user is using encryption, and has proxies in several countries....
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(i'm not being a smartass, I actually don't know)
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but all that really does is create a market for "teller" and "booker" services.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: move to a more democratic country
Visit: Mundo Hoje
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