4Chan Mocks $700K Fine For UK Online Safety Breaches 177
The UK regulator Ofcom fined 4chan nearly $700,000 (520,000 pounds) for failing to implement age checks and address illegal content risks under the Online Safety Act, but the platform mocked the penalty and signaled it won't pay. A lawyer representing the company responded with an AI-generated cartoon image of a hamster, writing in a follow-up post on X: "In the only country in which 4chan operates, the United States, it is breaking no law and indeed its conduct is expressly protected by the First Amendment." The BBC reports: The fines also include 50,000 pounds for failing to assess the risk of illegal material being published and a further 20,000 pounds for failing to set out how it protects users from criminal content. 4Chan has refused to pay all previous fines from Ofcom. "Companies -- wherever they're based -- are not allowed to sell unsafe toys to children in the UK. And society has long protected youngsters from things like alcohol, smoking and gambling. The digital world should be no different," said Ofcom's Suzanne Cater. "The UK is setting new standards for online safety. Age checks and risk assessments are cornerstones of our laws, and we'll take robust enforcement action against firms that fall short."
4Chan toy store? (Score:5, Funny)
Companies -- wherever they're based -- are not allowed to sell unsafe toys to children in the UK.
Wait - 4chan is now a toy store?
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Wait - 4chan sells stuff?
Re: 4Chan toy store? (Score:2)
4chan still exists? I haven't heard anything about that site in ages.
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you are not far off. A lot of the new rising stars on the right got their start on 4chan and turned their edgelord persona into political capital.
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It wasn't social media algorithms that gave Trump credibility. It was "the media", which while it is not a single thing, is very close to being so since the vast majority of media outlets are owned and/or operated by just a few billionaires. They downplayed his threat and even the ones speaking against him softballed him right into the white house.
And how much of that media got its leads from social media? Yes, the traditional media, such as it still exists, did help him, but he wouldn't have pinged their radar as a serious candidate if not for the online momentum he built, mostly around being good for engagement. And all the bigger media outlets had been using social media trends to drive stories for years before he started his political climb from his traditional slumlord / failed business man persona.
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And how much of that media got its leads from social media?
Not so much "lead" as trying to get back the audience they lost to social media. It's something that has stuck in the craw of the old-time publishers. The younger generation skipped off to the electronic versions which have a much lower investment barrier to entry. All that's left for the NYT, WP, etc. are the old hippies. Same for the television networks. All the ads are for medicare scams and "final expense" insurance policies.
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You have been playing the propaganda game too long. I don't have
Re:4Chan toy store? (Score:5, Insightful)
You have been playing the propaganda game too long. I don't have a problem with you trying to make a point, but don't get down in the gutter and play the game where you take something out of context and pretend that the it is the statement in its entirety.
I mean, their government's whole point was trying to draw a false equivalence between selling physical goods (importing a product into a country) and running a website (allowing free speech to be served by a machine that provides content when asked). Tearing down that false equivalence between taking an action to bring something into a country (active, requiring actions by someone in that country) and merely passively having your speech available to someone in a country really is the crux of any rational argument on the subject, though I'd have used a lot more words.
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No. It wasn't. The false equivalence is only part of the statement. The reason why you believe that is that you focused on just that one sentence, which is my point. The entire paragraph is a "won't somebody think of the children" argument, almost always used to leverage peoples sympathy and get them to back legislation that actually has the purpose of eroding privacy. It is about age checks, not online freedom of speech, or who can and cannot purchase things online.
I don't focus on that point. I just recognize that you're not going to stop people from screaming "Think of the children." They're going to do that no matter what, because they know that people become completely irrational whenever kids are involved, and they know that using kids as an excuse will get you past a large percentage of people's bulls**t filters.
The only thing you can really do is destroy the fundamental arguments that they use to support their position that doing this specific thing for child
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It isn't a false equivalence (because it is the first of three equal cases, to wit, ways we "protect the children") and it doesn't suggest 4chan is a toy store at all. By focusing on that sentence you allow the conversation to be quickly siderailed.
It is a false equivalence. Other than gambling, everything on that list is something physical that causes physical harm. Gambling is psychologically addictive for some people, and can cause psychological harm. Free speech is neither physical nor psychologically addictive. Lumping free speech in with gambling, alcohol, smoking, or dangerous toys is pathologically dubious to the point of being insulting to anyone with common sense.
But the only way you can break the "think of the children" argument is by u
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allowing free speech to be served by a machine that provides content when asked
Let me stop you there. You're applying concepts from one country in another. There's no free speech right in the UK, never has been. The false equivalence you're claiming exists breaks down since you're talking about concepts from two different legal systems.
Re:4Chan toy store? (Score:4, Insightful)
If the UK is so different and doesn't support the principles that made the Internet possible in the first place, then they should simply disconnect the country. Problem solved.
Re:4Chan toy store? (Score:4, Insightful)
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The funniest part is that when 4chan sued Ofcom in the US, Ofcom tried to get the suit dismissed due to lack of jurisdiction.
They are now claiming sovereign immunity too, as a branch of the UK government.
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Regardless of the merits of this action, why are there so many morons out there who think some other countries laws should apply in every other country?
Because each person is the center of the Universe; therefore, their country's law should affect the entire Universe.
(this is a statement on human psychology and perspective, not an accusation of narcissism against the entire world)
Re:4Chan toy store? (Score:4, Informative)
I don't think whoever you think you're talking to can hear you. But I can't even tell who that is. Is it Suzanne Cater? The article writer? the summary writer?
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The first sentence was intended to be one of multiple examples of "think of the children" scenarios.
And you thought it would be a good idea to charge in and defend that? Are you new?
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The UK should erect a firewall to fence off their own Internet from foreign Boogeymen, and stop entertaining the world with their own stupidity.
I'm not a fan of 4chan, but they're not the morons in this particular fiasco.
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Re:4Chan toy store? (Score:5, Insightful)
They're saying 4Chan is a toy, not a toy store. Which... is not completely unfair.
However, 4Chan doesn't operate in the UK. British people can access it, sure, but unless it actually does commerce with British people in some way there's simply no legitimate way in which the UK can suggest it's under their jurisdiction. At best they can fine ISPs for providing access to it. They would, indeed, be the "toy stores" in this scenario as they sell access to the toys.
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It would be like buying a toy from a US store and having it shipped to you in the UK. The responsibility for it being safe beyond the extent of US law is on you, the importer.
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I think that is precisely, and very worryingly, where this debate is headed: Since the UK can not stop non-UK Internet sites from existing, let's make it the ISPs' responsibility to protect our children - and drop a huge fine on one the first time we find it allowing a child to acccess something awful. "Not fair!" will cry the ISPs, "We had no idea that site hosted awful stuff, how are we even meant to check?" "Well, we at the government have a list of permissable sites here for you." And Hadrian's Grea
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I don't see it going as far as a whitelist, because that's impractical to maintain. But a blacklist is highly like and there's some precedent for that.
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"4Chan doesn't operate in the UK. British people can access it"
If 4Chan doesn't operate in the UK, do the users in the UK operate in the US?
If a user in the UK *bought* something form a site in the US, but did not give them any money in return, does the user in the UK have any debt or liability to the site?
If the site in the US did not provide the purchased item, does the site have any liability to the user under UK law?
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> If a user in the UK *bought* something form a site in the US, but did not give them any money in return, does the user in the UK have any debt or liability to the site?
> If the site in the US did not provide the purchased item, does the site have any liability to the user under UK law?
In those cases, yes, because they're engaging in commerce. Indeed, both jurisdictions can weigh in.
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"Indeed, both jurisdictions can weigh in."
Does the internet occur in both locations? In neither?
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4Chan needs to either geolocate and block any access from the UK or stick to the rules of providing services here.
There it is. The most asinine thing I've read on the Internet this morning. Ofcom can clutch their pearls as hard as they wish, but they have no jurisdiction over a company with no UK nexus. If they don't like 4chan - and I'm sure they just picked this site as a test case, because there are many sites in the US that don't comply with UK age/content regulations (and never will) - they can take action inside their own jurisdiction, such as forcing ISPs to block it, or some other draconian censorship nonsense.
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> Is the provider being compensated for the provision of that service? Yes, although not by the person receiving it. Therefore they are providing a commercial service
This is some twisted logic. No, they're not being compensated by any British entity, nor do they have offices or employees in the UK, so no, they are not operating in Britain. They have as much of a relationship to the UK as US factory does to an importer who orders toys to be delivered to their New York Office and then ships them to their L
Re: 4Chan toy store? (Score:3)
No, the UK needs to block 4chan if they don't want their citizens to be able to access it. It's not 4chan's responsibility. If the UK wants to be Daddy, it has to do Daddy things, not cry about how people not under their jurisdiction don't do what they want. That's weak and pathetic.
UK folks went to 4chan, 4chan did not go to UK (Score:2)
Companies -- wherever they're based -- are not allowed to sell unsafe toys to children in the UK.
When a person from the UK travels to another country, they are no longer in the UK and UK laws no longer apply. The person went to 4chan, 4chan did not go to the UK.
"4chan has stated it has no physical presence, employees, assets, or operations in the United Kingdom"
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they are no longer in the UK and UK laws no longer apply.
You're blissfully unaware of how laws work.
There are certain crimes that can be prosecuted and punished in the UK even if they were committed in Thailand or Antarctica. It is sufficient that they can get to you somehow, for example via an Interpol arrest request or an extradition order or by freezing your assets, etc.
Don't trust me, look it up, I'm sure chatgpt can fill you in.
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they are no longer in the UK and UK laws no longer apply.
You're blissfully unaware of how laws work.
There are certain crimes that can be prosecuted and punished in the UK even if they were committed in Thailand or Antarctica. It is sufficient that they can get to you somehow, for example via an Interpol arrest request or an extradition order or by freezing your assets, etc.
Don't trust me, look it up, I'm sure chatgpt can fill you in.
You're blissfully unaware of how national sovereignty works.
Good luck getting the US to accommodate an Interpol extradition request for 4chan and its personnel. There's no reason the US would agree to it since 4chan has violated no US law. So long as 4chan operates in the US exclusively and violates no US laws, they are effectively beyond the reach of the UK government. They could presumably nab some 4chan executive if they ever visited the UK, but all one has to do to avoid that is just not visit the UK
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on the contrary, i'm well aware that some criminals choose territories that disregard law to hide from justice, e.g. shitholes like trumpistan or the putin pederation. the downside is that the criminals are confined to staying there.
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Companies -- wherever they're based -- are not allowed to sell unsafe toys to children in the UK.
Wait - 4chan is now a toy store?
The thing is, the UK safety laws don't apply in China where you can sell unsafe toys to children.
That's the crux of the matter, UK law applies in the UK only. #Chan is right to tell OfCom to go pound sand (with a 21" retractable baton).
By and large the UK gets laws right, safety without giving up liberty (despite what the far right propaganda says) however this is one of the cases where they've got it horribly wrong simply because they didn't understand the technology involved. The people who created
Cringeworthy (Score:5, Insightful)
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What makes you think subsequent governments will be any better?
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Or that this has anything whatsoever to do with protecting children?
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For some reason, post-Brexit UK is clearly ahead of the EU in the race for limiting freedoms of the people. Although one of the main goals of Brexit was precisely to protect freedoms of the people.
Re: Cringeworthy (Score:2)
"Although one of the main goals of Brexit was precisely to protect freedoms of the people."
Only the people with all of the money, though.
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It's never been about age, it's about I.D. (Score:5, Insightful)
Age checks are just the first step off a very slippery slope. It's never been about age, the end game is about ID. Resist them while you still can. Save those uncontaminated OS installers, while you can.
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How would 4chan even check this? To be clear, it is against the rules to post and use 4chan uinder 18 years of age but they actually expect any random website which “shows content” to require verification of age of everyone who goes onto it?
Seems fairly impossible in practice. Slashdot obviously doesn't do that either.
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they actually expect any random website which “shows content” to require verification of age of everyone who goes onto it?
It's limited to sites which allow harmful or pornographic content. But otherwise, yes, that is exactly the matter at issue.
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So Google? I always find it weird that people attack websites like 4chan or Tumblr for showing pornographic content when you can just get that in Google image search as well.
Also, any small erotic artist with his own website who just draws things or takes amateur pornographic photography has to implement this system for any visitor? That's pretty impossible.
Something tells me they're only going after websites they don't like. Equal application of the law is quite the scarcity.
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Search engines and indexers are treated differently under the law, and there seems to be some distinction based on whether a major/primary purpose of the site is to serve harmful/pornographic material. But, yeah, it seems squishy enough that if enough people start complaining to the media or politicians about how their kids are able to do a Google Images search for "boobs", maybe Google would be in the crosshairs.
My sense is that Ofcom is cultivating public opinion by first going after sites that are pret
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"The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all."
-- H. L. Mencken
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It may turn out to be a net positive in the end. This will drive adoption of VPNs and other security measures, to avoid leaking personal data to age verification companies. There was some movement after Snowden, but not enough.
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It may turn out to be a net positive in the end. This will drive adoption of VPNs and other security measures, to avoid leaking personal data to age verification companies.
Cue the what good is a phone call clip from the Matrix here.
Obviously the next step is making age verification mandatory but it's not too many more steps to having a phone home requirement to verify it.
Re: It's never been about age, it's about I.D. (Score:2)
Re: It's never been about age, it's about I.D. (Score:3)
Just because it's a fallacy doesn't mean it's incorrect - it just means it's not *always* correct.
Re:It's never been about age, it's about I.D. (Score:5, Insightful)
“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.”
~ William Pitt the Younger
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This is the repeat of history.
What history are you thinking of where age checks led to ID as the endgame?
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The part where the "age check" they will ask 4chan to use is some shady as fuck system to get face scans/ids for every user.
It has nothing to do with children, and it is being pushed on everything at once for a reason or two.
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You didn't use logic you just made a list of things you don't like. The question was about history.
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Except this isn't a slippery slope. This is the repeat of history.
Even if it were a repeat of history it doesn't change the fact that the point is a slippery slope fallacy. You're extrapolating a currently non-existent case to make a point not currently supported.
In order for it to not be a slippery slope fallacy you need to have evidence that the end game is actually the goal, otherwise you're blindly making claims which aren't backed by any evidence.
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otherwise you're blindly making claims which aren't backed by any evidence.
Evidence: History, current events, having a clue.
If you somehow don't think governments will seek ever more information, power, and control, you're provably not thinking. Especially since, as you noted elsewhere, the UK does not have free speech.
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It's not even logic, it's just simple pattern recognition.
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https://yourlogicalfallacyis.c... [yourlogicalfallacyis.com]
*facepalm* (Score:5, Insightful)
This was always going to end this way. Sorry Ofcom but 4chan is 100% in the right here. Your authority extends only to requesting it be blocked in your country. Nothing more.
This isn't a multinational company and it is not in any way subject to any laws other than US law.
Re:*facepalm* (Score:5, Insightful)
The failure is the point. They are trying to work up to getting VPNs blocked. I suspect they will have shrunk our economy by 60% before we manage to stop them. I only hope that, at that point, I will be able to get a legalized lynch mob up for them. The chances are reasonably good.
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Blocking them (or regulating them, which I think is more likely) will drive them underground - which is really where they belong anyway.
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Huh. Nearly every corporate uses a VPN to get external connectivity to their internal network.
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They are trying to work up to getting VPNs blocked.
You're putting the conspiracy cart before the horse. As of now they haven't even blocked the website without VPN yet, and even if they did block it right now 100% of blocks in the UK are via DNS which means it wouldn't even affect you if you use a public DNS server like Google's or Cloudflare, let alone switch to DOH or some other resolution protocol.
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it wouldn't even affect you if you use a public DNS server like Google's or Cloudflare
I wouldn't be so sure about that. [ispreview.co.uk]
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The failure is the point. They are trying to work up to getting VPNs blocked. I suspect they will have shrunk our economy by 60% before we manage to stop them. I only hope that, at that point, I will be able to get a legalized lynch mob up for them. The chances are reasonably good.
Brexit has already shrunk our economy by at least 60%.
Both major parties are in the pockets of big business and they'll put a stop to this nonsense before it gets that far. Yay corruption.
Re:*facepalm* (Score:4, Insightful)
This was always going to end this way. Sorry Ofcom but 4chan is 100% in the right here. Your authority extends only to requesting it be blocked in your country. Nothing more.
This isn't a multinational company and it is not in any way subject to any laws other than US law.
The US should think and act the same way: activities, companies and individuals outside the borders of the US are not subject to US laws. America is not the world's police force, as much as it likes to think it is. Mind your own business, and the rest of the world should do the same.
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And you can rest easy knowing the US is currently crippling and isolating itself, so it will likely back off some of its nastier behavior over the long term. (Although the short term is turning out to be... interesting.)
But to be realistic you need to note US is not uniquely bad here. Nations have interests, not morals. If one ends up substantially more powerful than peers, it will throw its weight around. And the US, for all its faults and evils, has mostly promoted human rights and an
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"This isn't a multinational company and it is not in any way subject to any laws other than US law."
Where does the internet occur? What does it mean to liability if cause and effect are separated by a border?
Suppose two people are standing in opposite sides of an international border. One person shoots the other and the second person dies. In one country there was no death; in the other there is no perpetrator. Did a murder occur in any jurisdiction?
New standards (Score:3)
"The UK is setting new standards for online safety.
They say that like all standards are good.
::pinkyfinger:: one MILLION wattovolts (Score:2)
inb4 they fire up StoreChan, which only sells electric euthanasia dildos
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Well, that was one google search that I was happy to confirm to have produced zero relevant results.
We stray further from God's Light on most days, but not today. Not today Satan.
Only the "think of the children" pearl cluchers do (Score:2)
this: use their own children to drive their (flawed) arguments and reasoning.
Incredibly based (Score:2)
Makes me want to start using 4chan. That's amazingly based and I wish that the Linux kernel and distro maintainers would take a similar approach to these absolutely asinine, insecure, and socially dangerous "age verification" requirements being hoisted by the likes of Meta on the world.
Theocracies (Score:3)
There are some very conservative religious countries that would do more than fine many UK websites if they had free reign.
Be careful what you wish for.
Universal principles can theoretically keep the peace.
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There are some very conservative religious countries that would do more than fine many UK websites if they had free reign.
If Slashdot fined people for using words they don't understand they could fund this site without selling ads.
They're going to have to do the age checks soon (Score:2)
We let the people at the top have too much money and power and they're using it. Whether you agree or disagree is immaterial now.
You can try to take away the money and power but I don't think people are willing to do that because.. actually I don't know why. I can think of sever
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Not a sure thing. (Score:2)
Several people have pointed out the futility of trying to apply your country's laws to people based out of other countries, but it isn't quite as pointless as you might think. There are all sorts of mechanisms for handling this, starting with extradition treaties (where the whole idea is countries selectively respecting each other's laws), as well as working directly with banks. The US is not the only country that pulls the 'well, because your bank wants to operate in the US, they accept orders to freeze
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If America is willing to extradite Americans to the Youkay for a crime that's a blatant First Amendment violation, then the US effectively no longer exists.
I mean, it's possible, but at that point you might as well stick a fork in it and admit it's done.
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Can a 12-yr old walk into a store in the US and buy a porn mag? If not, then you already have a precedent for requiring age-verification before allowing access to the writings (speech) of a third person.
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Probably not. Not because it isn't allowed, but because the Internet put all the porn mags out of business. But yeah, kids used to be able to buy a Playboy, it depended only on the individual store's policy, not what the government said.
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There are all sorts of mechanisms for handling this, starting with extradition treaties
Extradition treaties require that the alleged offence be a crime in both countries. If the UK tried for extradition in this case, 4Chan's lawyers would have it laughed out of the US court which has to decide whether to allow the extradition.
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The UK and all EU countries operate block lists.
If 4chan is found to be supplying content "illegally" (by local definition, not "US-imposed international law"), they can be added to the block list.
Then all credit card, donation, advertising, supply, datacentres, servers, online services, etc. based in the UK... will be forced to stop supplying services to them. ISPs will be forced to block them.
Well, not even forced. ISPs already have to abide by a blocklist maintained by the Internet Watch Foundation (a
So stupid (Score:3)
Two people stand across a border. On one side, a man in a country where it's legal to sell guns, on the other, a man who wants to buy a gun in a country where they're prohibited.
If the guy who wants to buy leans over the border and takes a gun, that's his country's problem. It's only the other guy's problem if no money is left behind in the gun's place.
No online service is going to adhere to the rules of every country in the world. If your country doesn't like that, it better get working on a really good national firewall.
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I suspect a national firewall is the endgame, where we only have access to information vetted by the government, and it's a sad and frightening thought.
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You still need a firewall to handle non-signatories, and laws banning circumvention... it's similar to customs handling trade, except it's electrons and smuggling is almost trivially easy.
Good for them. The UK government is overreaching (Score:2)
Until the owners forget one day and (Score:2)
talk about an own goal (Score:2, Insightful)
And society has long protected youngsters from things like alcohol, smoking and gambling.
You take care of Prince Andrew. We'll deal with HiroMoot.
So what, if anything, is the US doing to all the other Epstein pedos?
*crickets chirping*
thought so...
Re:Checkem (Score:4, Insightful)
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The BBC has a world service, and that was where they would have entered it. Had it just been a local British program, he may not have noticed or bothered
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The BBC World Service is radio-only. There's a cable channel, BBC America, that's available in the US, but this never aired the programme in question. The BBC's on-demand service, BBC iPlayer, isn't available in the US. So there was no legitimate way for anyone in the US to have seen the programme, and the US court should throw the case out.
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