Investigation into 4chan and its compliance with duties to protect its users

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-content/investigation-into-4chan-and-its-compliance-with-duties-to-protect-its-users-from-illegal-content

88•HatchedLake721•5mo ago

Comments

rahidz•5mo ago

4chan's response (through lawyers): https://x.com/prestonjbyrne/status/1956391746029428914

Full text:

"BYRNE & STORM, P.C.

ATTORNEYS-AT-LAW

Re: Statement Regarding Ofcom's Reported Provisional Notice - 4chan Community Support LLC

Byrne & Storm, P.C. ( @ByrneStorm ) and Coleman Law, P.C. ( @RonColeman ) represent 4chan Community Support LLC ("4chan").

According to press reports, the U.K. Office of Communications ("Ofcom") has issued a provisional notice under the Online Safety Act alleging a contravention by 4chan and indicating an intention to impose a penalty of £20,000, plus daily penalties thereafter.

4chan is a United States company, incorporated in Delaware, with no establishment, assets, or operations in the United Kingdom. Any attempt to impose or enforce a penalty against 4chan will be resisted in U.S. federal court.

American businesses do not surrender their First Amendment rights because a foreign bureaucrat sends them an e-mail. Under settled principles of U.S. law, American courts will not enforce foreign penal fines or censorship codes.

If necessary, we will seek appropriate relief in U.S. federal court to confirm these principles.

United States federal authorities have been briefed on this matter.

The Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, was reportedly warned by the White House to cease targeting Americans with U.K. censorship codes (according to reporting in the Telegraph on July 30th).

Despite these warnings, Ofcom continues its illegal campaign of harassment against American technology firms. A political solution to this matter is urgently required and that solution must come from the highest levels of American government.

We call on the Trump Administration to invoke all diplomatic and legal levers available to the United States to protect American companies from extraterritorial censorship mandates.

Our client reserves all rights."

Barbing•5mo ago

Thanks - so instead they’ll be sued by someone under those new US state laws that cover sites featuring some % of adult content?

(There was a worrisome blog post someone shared here on HN a few weeks ago.)

arcfour•5mo ago

No.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

It’s funny. Their “Advertise” page explicitly mentions UK on demographics section (7% of users). Both Advertise and Rules pages explicitly mention local along with US laws. It looks like they actually do business in UK serving ads to UK users and thus should be subject to local laws themselves.

narrator•5mo ago

If they want their assets, they will have to use U.S courts to get them and U.S courts will refuse to enforce British law that violates the first amendment. It's pretty simple actually. If they had assets in Britain, then they could get to them, but they don't.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

They can just treat 4chan as malware server or a drug cartel. There exist sanction mechanisms against foreign entities that do not use local law enforcement in which case opinion of US courts will be irrelevant.

achierius•5mo ago

But it's not, and so the treaties to which the US is party for those cases would not apply.

What sanction methods are you thinking of that could get to US citizens on US soil without US governmental consent?

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

1. Preventing those citizens from doing illegal activities on UK soil

2. Using broader spectrum of law enforcement options if those citizens arrive in the UK

ffsm8•5mo ago

Blows my mind someone actually unironically makes this argument.

4chan is showing ads on their site, but if your idea had any grounds, the issue would be with the ad network, not 4chan.

While that'd be a pretty bad legal precedent too, it'd at least be coherent.

More realistically, 4chan will likely be banned by UK ISPs after a court ruling.

The previous mail was likely just to move the process forward to show they have no interest in following the UK law.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

>4chan is showing ads on their site, but if your idea had any grounds, the issue would be with the ad network, not 4chan.

It's hard to understand the logic of this statement. Why the ad network? 4chan business is to show ads to users while offering them a platform for conversations. What 3rd party service do they use is irrelevant unless that is by coincidence an UK company.

>More realistically, 4chan will likely be banned by UK ISPs after a court ruling.

This is exactly what my comment above means.

frumplestlatz•5mo ago

Serving ads to UK users does not grant the UK enforcement jurisdiction over 4chan. They have no presence, assets, or agents in the UK. If the UK still attempts to issue a judgement contrary to the first amendment, the constitution in general, and/or US law, it will not be recognized by US courts.

In short, the UK can kick rocks.

8note•5mo ago

the UK could block access to 4chan, or block the ability for 4chan to sell ads in the UK

pseudo0•5mo ago

It's bad optics to build their own Hadrian's Firewall, so they are trying to bully foreign companies into compliance instead. If they want to go after the ad revenue, they would have to try to identify and prosecute the UK-based companies doing business with 4chan, and they will struggle to do that when they have no ability to subpoena 4chan for their business records.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

Such firewall exists everywhere, because courts can block access to various websites on different grounds (malware, copyright infringement etc) everywhere.

Ferret7446•5mo ago

4chan will laugh and UK users will VPN to access 4chan and nothing of value will have been provided by this laughingstock of regulation.

horseradish7k•5mo ago

except 4chan disallows posting from vpns, which is probably why they didn't self censor already

red-iron-pine•5mo ago

yeah they been blocking VPNs for a long time.

Ferret7446•5mo ago

Most users lurk, not post (as for all social media).

Using a pass allows posting from VPN (and posting without a pass is really annoying last I checked, as the anti-spam measure are quite insistent).

So if you were posting previously (with a pass) then nothing has changed.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

Nobody in the world cares about US constitution or opinion of US courts. It is absolutely irrelevant. If American company does business somewhere and breaks local laws, that part of their business can be disrupted or shut down (by blocking traffic, restricting financial transactions to certain entities, blocking shipments), executives may be arrested on arrival, there may be secondary sanctions etc.

This is absolutely common practice happening everywhere. There is a firewall in every country. Think of malware servers that America blocks.

jacquesm•5mo ago

> Nobody in the world cares about US constitution or opinion of US courts.

Reminder not to take any kind of legal advice from HN.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

As if any government would ever take any advice from HN... :)

No, seriously, what's your point? That for a G7 government interfering with interests of American companies outside of US jurisdiction it is somehow a problem?

jacquesm•5mo ago

Yes, it is 'somehow a problem'. Just like the reverse is 'somehow a problem'. Effectively advising a large audience that they can ignore the law whereas there are plenty of examples of why you probably shouldn't be ignoring the law is a pretty silly thing to do.

https://archives.fbi.gov/archives/stlouis/press-releases/200...

Is one of my favorite examples to point to but there are countless others besides.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

> Effectively advising a large audience that they can ignore the law

Who did that?

Edit: I agree with you, just don’t understand why did you choose to reply to that part of my comment.

klipklop•5mo ago

Yeah man nobody cares about freedom of speech. /s

You know that first amendment of the thing you say nobody cares about. A fundamental human right people are giving up in the UK so they can be “protected” from big bad ol 4chan. What a joke…

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

Last time I checked USA is not the most democratic country in the world (#28 in democracy index below Uruguay, Czechia and Malta), so it is certainly not the role model for freedom. Yes, surprise, there exist other views in the world on how to find the balance between many different fundamental human rights and it does not mean those views reject freedom of speech. They just restrict it differently than America (which has several categories of unprotected speech and ranks lower in press freedom indices than some other countries which may restrict more categories).

bloak•5mo ago

To me that response seems ridiculous in several ways. If they think that UK law doesn't apply to them (which seems very credible) why react at all? Describing what Ofcom is doing, which is, as far as I can tell, just doing the job it was set up to do, as "illegal"? Suggesting that 4chan has some connection to "technology firms"?

If they were going to write anything at all, how about "I fart in your general direction"?

frumplestlatz•5mo ago

The response is effectively that, but with a framing much more amenable to their own future defense on both legal and political fronts, if ever required.

bentley•5mo ago

> If they think that UK law doesn't apply to them (which seems very credible) why react at all?

If I get a speeding ticket in the mail from another state I've never been to, I'm not going to ignore it, I'm going to explain to the court why it's invalid. Ignoring legal notices, even from other jurisdictions than one's own, is generally unwise (with some exceptions). So is responding with insults instead of concrete legal justification for why this is inapplicable.

justlikereddit•5mo ago

You get a speeding ticket from Pakistan and you'll really go to the court in Islamabad to explain your case?

bentley•5mo ago

Notice how I said “some exceptions,” precisely to head off a comment like that. Or did you read “some exceptions” and think your example wouldn’t qualify?

No, I don’t care what Pakistan thinks of me. But I've been to the UK, and I'll probably go there again. I live my life according to American law, without regard for UK law, but if UK law enforcement publicly announced an investigation of me, I'd find legal representation and respond. (Remotely.)

boppo1•5mo ago

4chan will win, american techbros will celebrate, then in a year the US will pass some sort of KYC.

Surveillance is inevitable.

userbinator•5mo ago

Only with that defeatist attitude will it be inevitable.

schoen•5mo ago

A great and inspiring example is the SOPA/PIPA thing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act#Opposit...

Now, there are other less inspiring examples (e.g. SESTA/FOSTA)! and this didn't somehow form a durable political consensus (or an entrenched legal principle), but people looking at this issue in advance would have thought, and did think, that obviously this legislation would pass. And then it didn't.

MikeTheGreat•5mo ago

genuine question: what is a "KYC"?

sciurus•5mo ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Know_your_customer

MikeTheGreat•5mo ago

Thanks!

benchloftbrunch•5mo ago

Know your customer

MikeTheGreat•5mo ago

Thanks!

ranger_danger•5mo ago

Why do they think that organizations who operate completely outside of the UK, accept no money from UK citizens or otherwise do business there, fall within their jurisdiction? I think realistically all that could happen is they tell ISPs to block it.

Retr0id•5mo ago

> they tell ISPs to block it

Seems likely. And then that won't work, and they'll tell ISPs to block VPN traffic too.

nubinetwork•5mo ago

I wouldn't put it past them, they've already ran tv news pieces (or maybe it was an ad, I don't watch tv, let alone British tv) basically saying that if you use a VPN, that you're not thinking of the children.

madaxe_again•5mo ago

You wouldn’t steal a car…

bloak•5mo ago

ISPs blocking it will mostly work, I think. Most people can't be bothered with a VPN so if 4chan is inaccessible they'll just read/watch something else instead.

Retr0id•5mo ago

In the days following the enforcement of age verification legislation, VPNs were trending in the UK app store charts, above age verification apps.

Even today NordVPN is in the #5 spot, above Uber and Google.

theodric•5mo ago

I think you severely underestimate the tech savviness and community-seeking of 4chan users. They'll figure it out.

andai•5mo ago

I think you can't post on 4chan if you're using a VPN.

ranger_danger•5mo ago

you can if you buy a 4chan pass with crypto

Symbiote•5mo ago

That will make blocking it fairly effective, at least if 4chan's demographic is as I remember it to be (teenagers etc).

red-iron-pine•5mo ago

they were teenagers in 2018. now they're 30-somethings with enough disposable income and basic technical skills to download a PIA or NordVPN app to their phone.

dzhiurgis•5mo ago

Elon needs to release Starlink Freedom Edition. He should've bought 4chan rather than Twitter too lol.

daft_pink•5mo ago

Maybe they will say British citizens use it in foreign countries as their loophole. I don’t agree with it and I’m not a lawyer but I’m just predicting their argument.

torium•5mo ago

Sounds like the same argument that Russia uses to invades its neighbors. "There's Russians there, therefore..."

BrenBarn•5mo ago

Okay, but that's still not 4chan's problem. A company with no nexus in the UK has no reason to care about UK law in any way, shape, or form.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

According to their Advertise page, UK is 7% of their audience. Their reaction looks like they care.

frumplestlatz•5mo ago

They might care about lost advertising dollars, but the UK has no jurisdiction and judgements contrary to the constitution will not be recognized by US courts.

Their reaction puts on record the constitutional/legal barriers, preserves strategic optionality, and possibly preempts escalation that could still cause real headaches. It's strategic, not a sign that they actually think the UK has a case.

ben_w•5mo ago

> or otherwise do business

If they can be used in the UK, then the same general principle applies here as with pirate radio and over-the-horizon artillery.

The attempt is unlikely to work, but with Trump who knows, so they will probably indeed tell ISPs to block it.

amiga-workbench•5mo ago

They do accept money from UK citizens, you can buy a 4chan pass to skip the captcha. I've done so in the past.

wakawaka28•5mo ago

What are they gonna do, stop UK citizens from spending money how they want? Or will they try to invade the US again? Lol

ranger_danger•5mo ago

I don't think crypto housed outside the UK counts, but I could be wrong. But it's not like there is a UK arm of the company they can even sue.

trothamel•5mo ago

A bagel shop in Manhattan also accepts money from UK citizens, but that doesn't mean it's subject to UK law.

ivan_gammel•5mo ago

If that bagel shop will ship bagels to UK soil or accepting money from UK citizens who are currently in UK as 4chan does, it will be subject to UK laws regardless of whether it has legal presence, assets etc. This is not matter of jurisdiction as some of commenters here believe.

UK has limited enforcement options, of course, but it’s their sovereign right to prevent illegal activities and/or punish for them within their capabilities. This is why 4chan lawyers are asking for political response as if UK were a rogue American colony.

rr808•5mo ago

USA is all about free speech because the big tech companies are in USA and behind closed doors do what the US Government tells them. If Meta/Google/Twitter/TikTok were foreign companies they'd likely be banned or regulated to be allowed to operate here.

daft_pink•5mo ago

Pretty sure the USA position has to do with the us constitution. Just saying

userbinator•5mo ago

TikTok? I know there's a fight going on with it but I believe it's still Chinese owned.

rr808•5mo ago

Its partially owned by ByteDance but a separate entity with majority US investors. https://usds.tiktok.com/usds-myths-vs-facts

> TikTok Inc., which offers the TikTok app in the United States, is incorporated in California and Delaware, and is subject to U.S. laws and regulations governing privacy and data security.

wakawaka28•5mo ago

USA is all about free speech because it is literally the first right in the Bill of Rights. Regardless of the extensive infringements we've suffered against our basic human rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights, there is a limit to how far they can take it.

mostlysimilar•5mo ago

The big tech companies are currently lobbying the US government to bring identity verification laws to us at a federal level. They stand to grow even more rich and even more powerful by being the gatekeepers of identity. Imagine if you could only log in to Hacker News by using your Google account.

It will kill whatever is left of small independent communities on the internet, and it's a disaster for free speech.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAd-OOrdyMw

jacquesm•5mo ago

It worked quite well in the reverse direction for BetOnSports. Companies tend to underestimate the reach of governments, even governments they are not nominally the subject of.

torium•5mo ago

Disgusting.

If I access 4chan only through tor, will I be safe from these tirants?

spookie•5mo ago

You'll just stick out like a sore thumb

torium•5mo ago

Could you expand? How does using tor makes you stick out like a sore thumb?

userbinator•5mo ago

It's been a long time since I've had anything to do with 4chan but I believe Tor was blocked because of how often it was used to post illegal (in the US) content.

ranger_danger•5mo ago

It works for reading at least, no idea about posting.

Hizonner•5mo ago

Somehow I feel like Ofcom and 4chan deserve each other.

Jigsy•5mo ago

Anon must be quaking in their boots.

tonfreed•5mo ago

Great. Now let's see them enforce it.

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Investigation into 4chan and its compliance with duties to protect its users

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