Silvio Berlusconi Pushes for Internet Regulation

Italian media is deeply concerned about Silvio Berlusconi’s much-debated campaign of controlling the content available on the Internet.

Following Berlusconi’s order, government officials in Italy have formulated a decree aimed at banning videos that may contain pornographic or violent content. Websites such as YouTube, the France-based Dailymotion, blogs and various other online resources targeted by the premier’s decree have joined forces in an attempt to prevent the institution of the projected legislation, arguing that it undermines freedom of expression and proposes measures that are very difficult to implement, such as monitoring of all uploaded content.

Berlusconi’s decree stipulates blocking any content perceived as inappropriate for minors, especially pornography or excessive violence, and obligates ISP’s to close down any website that doesn’t respect the legislation’s terms. Website administrators are instructed to disallow the upload of videos without prior verification and validation of their content. Those who do not comply may risk fines of up to 150,000 euros or even lawsuit.

According to Carlo Carnevale Maffe, an Internet economist at Milan's Bocconi University, it is necessary to regulate the Internet in a manner similar to other economic platforms; otherwise, the major companies will monopolize the market, gaining a lot of power and depriving other companies of their chance to compete fairly. Maffe claims that online resources such as Google and YouTube should have less freedom regarding the allowance of online content, and should follow specific rules. “We need to upgrade the legal platform to make sure the Internet is not blocked from innovation, but to give fair competition to the Internet", Maffe concluded.

Google representatives have expressed their concern that Berlusconi’s decree primarily aims to control user-generated content, vital for the functioning of websites such as YouTube, and claim that this type of content cannot be managed in the same manner as TV network content is.

Marco Pancini, European senior policy counsel of Google Italia recently stated in an interview for the Italian media that the new decree threatens to “destroy the Internet”. However, he believes that the government will consider the complaints of telecommunication providers and the Italian associations for Internet and ultimately decide to revise the over demanding terms.