For policy & rights online

European Union IP Policy

The European Union has many policy intiatives related to the Internet, ecommerce and online content or copyright. In fact, there are so many, it is frequently difficult to keep up with them. In 2015, these were grouped together under an umbrella initiative called the 'Digital Single Market'.

In this section, I report on Internet-related matters within the EU institutions - European Commisission, Council and Parliament - and the activites of the key policy-makers. I log policy initiatives that cut across the traditional policy silos. Specific policies such as the IPR enforcement directive and IP or copyright reforms are reported in a dedicated sub-section for IPRED. The sub-section on Internet Threats looks at any EU policy initiatives other than copyright which imply Internet blocking. The sub-section on Internet Freedoms has a focus on rights and freedoms and the European Convention on Human Rights.

If you are interested in EU policy for IP, you may like my book The Closing of the Net which discusses it in the light of influencing factors by States and industry stakeholders.

If you are interested in copyright policy, you may like my previous books A Copyright Masquerade: How Corporate Lobbying Threatens Online Freedoms and The Copyright Enforcement Enigma - Internet Politics and the ‘Telecoms Package’

Balancing freedom of expression online: insights from copyright cases

Monica Horten

Published on 05 June 2017

Copyright enforcement remains an ongoing policy issue, with the current processing of the new Copyright Directive in the European Parliament.

This article is the text of my speech at the Council of Europe "Freedom of Expression Online" conference in Nicosia, Cyprus on 28 April 2017. The speech is entitled Balancing freedom of expression online: insights from copyright cases. I address Member State and ECJ caselaw, taking copyright enforcement cases, mainly from the UK, as examples. The cases concern the blocking or filtering of content, and balancing the conflicting rights of copyright versus freedom of expression.

EU copyright bombshell: social media sites to police content

Monica Horten

Published on 01 September 2016

In what can only be called a policy bombshell, proposed new EU copyright rules will force social media sites to police content. A leaked version of a proposed new copyright directive seeks to impose draconian monitoring obligations any sites that support content uploaded by users. If the leaked draft to be believed, content platforms will have to install content scanning systems to monitor and remove copyrighted material. In addition, they will have to report back to rightsholders.

EU announces radical copyright overhaul for cross-border content

Monica H

Published on 06 May 2015

The European Commission announced today radical plans to overhaul copyright. The proposals focus on users’ability to legally access copyrighted content across borders, and they are understood to have upset the entertainment and music industries. This is not surprising since the changes will cut right through their copyright-supported distribution infrastructure.

The main plank for change will be the territoriality of copyright. Territoriality refers to the way that the entertainment industries are organised around national borders for the granting of rights and the distribution and sale of goods. On the Internet, this system is managed by asking intermediaries to block content that is not