Germany is cracking down on hate speech online amid a rise in right-wing extremism, but critics warn that civil liberties will end up as collateral damage
to further toughen its rules — already considered some of the world's strictest — governing speech online.“Hate crimes should finally end up where they belong — in court,” said the Social Democrat Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht after the bill was approved by the government.
“There is no question that our society has a problem with right-wing extremism and hate speech," said Elisabeth Niekrenz of Berlin-based civil liberties organization Digitale Gesellschaft , "which deeply worries me. But the measures presented [by Lambrecht] infringe people's right to informational self-determination, open the door for more surveillance, grant law enforcement more powers to intervene and allow for more data collection.
Berlin's hate speech law also provides a major test case of cracking down on hate speech online at a time when the European Commission is examining new rules for policing content online — and looking closely at how Germany, France and the United Kingdom are handling the matter. “In many European countries, populists and extremists are rioting against democracy, dissenters and minorities,” she said. “The platforms are the same, and the racist and anti-Semitic messages are similar.”
From its onset, however, critics warned that the pioneering rulebook — the first major effect of a Western democracy to reign in hate speech online — had weaknesses.
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