Comment on Risks of self-hosting a public-facing forum?
irotsoma@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 days agoThis is especially necessary to consider if you live in the US right now. One of the things the current administration is pushing for even harder than past administrations is removal of Section 230 of the communications act that was enacted in the 90s. This provides a defense against liability for the content you host as long as you make a reasonable effort to remove content that is illegal. Problem is that this makes it really difficult to censor (maliciously or otherwise) content because it’s hard to go after the poster of the content and easier to go after the host or for the host to be under threat to stop it from being posted in the first place. But it’s a totally unreasonable thing, so it basically would mean every website would have to screen every piece of content manually with a legal team and thus would mean user generates content would go away because it would be extremely expensive to implement (to the chagrin of the broadcast content industries).
The DMCA created way for censors to file a complaint and have content taken down immediately before review, but that means the censors have to do a lot of work to implement it, so they’ve continued to push for total elimination of Section 230. Since it’s a problematic thing for fascism, the current administration has also been working hard to build a case so the current biased supreme court can remove it since legislation is unlikely to get through since those people have to get reelected whereas supreme court justices don’t care about their reputation.
So, check your local laws and if in the US, keep an eye on Section 230 news as well as making sure you have a proper way to handle DMCA takedown notices.
RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Sounds like hosting outside the US is a possible solution. Many things to be careful of, regardless.
Valmond@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Don’t chose china or russia though ;-)
irotsoma@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
Yeah, other countries have similar or even more strict requirements, so yeah it all depends on the jurisdiction. You have to also understand that just hosting something externally, doesn’t mean you don’t fall under laws of another country. It’s the internet. And if you live in a country, you may be held responsible for obeying their laws. I’m not a lawyer, so it’s something to be careful of even if externally hosted.
RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Somehow 4chan admins have largely escaped legal consequences for this stuff, and I don’t think it’s just because of sec230.
Not a fan of 4chan, but I do note both their and the pirate bay’s operation scheme.
irotsoma@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 days ago
I mean, in most cases this isn’t criminal law (in the US at least), so it means you have to attract enough attention of a corporation since they’re usually the only ones who can afford the legal costs to file the DMCA requests and responses for copyright violation. And with many other civil issues, often corporations with the money for it, don’t have standing to sue, and if they did, would be required to sue each individual in the appropriate jurisdiction.
With the removal of Section 230, these costs will go down significantly as a single user’s violation could be enough to bankrupt or shut down an entire site of violating content or, if serious criminal violations like child porn, put the person who hosts the site in prison who, will be much easier to identify and sue in a single jurisdiction or arrest than a random internet user.