The German Justice Minister Maas asshatted 'Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz' and the fact checkers

Heiko Maas sees a whole lotta stuff on the
internet that needs to be deleted.

To be sure, this new law will never ever pass the German Constitutional Court nor the ECHR. It is one of those lukewarm farts the Justice Min. is known for.  Besides, he has never worked a single day as a lawyer. Media lawyer Prof. Dr. Marc Liesching completely dismantles this law in a well-argued article in German language.

Anyway, the first paragraph of the law reads: (Google translate)

A. Problem and goal 

At present, a massive change in the social discourse in the network, especially in the social networks, is to be found. The debate culture in the network is often aggressive, hurtful and not infrequently hateful. Through hate criminality and other criminal offenses, anyone can be defamed based on opinion, skin color or origin, religion, gender or sexuality. Hate criminality and other criminal offenses that can not be effectively combated and prosecuted is a major threat to the peaceful coexistence of a free, open and democratic society. After the experiences in the US election campaign, the fight against criminal fake news ("fake news") has also gained a high priority in social networks in the Federal Republic of Germany. It is therefore necessary to improve the enforcement of the law in social networks in order to immediately remove objectively punishable content such as incitement, insult, slander or disturbance of public peace by pretending criminal offenses.

Read the last part of the last sentence again. "Pretending a criminal offense" is punishable. So if someone says I am now going to rob that bank over there, hear Heiko Maas' handcuffs click. No fucking around in Germany. There is more of such lax phrasing in the minister's law.

The blockbuster movie 'Suck my dick' convinced the Justice Minister
of the irresistible artistic talent of Natalia. Is she into weightlifting?

On page 3 it says:

In addition, the social networks are obliged by § 3 to provide effective and efficient complaints management. In particular, they are obliged to delete an obviously unlawful content within 24 hours of receipt of the complaint. Violations of this obligation may be punished with a fine. In this area, a considerable number of advertisements are expected to be received by the Federal Office of Justice. In the case of social networks, it is estimated that at least 500,000 complaints from the Federal Republic of Germany are reported annually because of hate criminality and other criminal contents. Deleted or blocked, however, is only a fraction of that. A large number of users who reported alleged hate criminality or other criminal offenses could be asked to submit their unsuccessful complaint to the Federal Office of Justice. It is estimated that this occurs in 5 percent of all unsuccessful complaints, ie in about 25 000 cases. However, since these advertisements are largely unfounded, an annual volume of proceedings of 500 fines can be expected in the field of complaint management.

Let's leave aside that something considered to be "obviously unlawful" is the sole business of a court to decide and not a law, here is a very recent study about the problems of fact checking. After all, the not so able minister's goal is to clean up the internet to German standards - "On the net much too little is deleted" in FAZ - and at the same time educating people to follow those standards. His way of thinking is simple, once it's gone, it's gone. Who cares?

The paper shows that the minister has no idea what he is talking about, how it works, what it entails and what you get at the end of the day.

Checking How Fact-checkers Check (Pdf)

Chloe Lim
Department of Political Science Stanford University

May 16, 2017

Abstract 

Fact-checking has gained prominence as a reformist movement to revitalize truth-seeking ideals in journalism. While fact-checkers are often assumed to code facts accurately, no studies have formally assessed fact-checkers’ performance. I evaluate the performance of two major online fact-checkers, Politfact at Tampa Bay Times and Fact Checker at Washington Post, comparing their interrater reliability using a method that is regularly utilized across the social sciences. I show that fact-checkers rarely fact-check the same statement, and when they do, there is little agreement in their ratings. Approximately, 1 in 10 statements is fact-checked by both fact-checking outlets, and among claims that both outlets check, their factual ratings have a Cohen’s κ of 0.52, an agreement rate much lower than what is acceptable for social scientific coding. The results suggest that difficulties in fact-checking elites’ statements may limit the ability of journalistic fact-checking to hold politicians accountable.

The whole study makes for pretty sobering reading.

4 Conclusion

Previous literature on fact-checking focuses on testing the corrective effects of fact-checks (Garrett et al. 2013; Jamieson and Gottfried 2010). Some found that fact-checking discourages politicians from promoting false or misleading claims, while others have argued that fact-checks have little to no effect in changing the behavior of political figures. Rather than revisiting how the performance of politicians or citizens has changed due to fact-checking, I evaluate the performance of fact-checkers themselves. More specifically, I examine two of the main factors which fact-checkers suggest make fact checking powerful: 1) overlap and 2) high consensus rate among major fact-checkers. My findings suggest that fact-checkers rarely fact-check the same statement and when they do, there is little agreement on its factual accuracy. This may weaken fact-checkers’ ability to provide credible information to readers and voters. The surprisingly low rate at which different fact checkers agree when evaluating the same statements suggests that providing objective information about candidates’ honesty is quite difficult. The lack of consensus between the two major online fact-checkers could also explain the mixed findings of the previous literature on the effects of fact-checking. A low consensus rate among fact checkers might encourage candidates to repeat false claims, because low credibility makes it less costly for candidates to dismiss the fact-checkers’ corrections. Moreover, the lack of consistency in how different fact-checkers choose and evaluate political claims may hinder the fact-checkers’ mission to fulfill the democratic ideal of political watchdog by disabusing readers of mistaken beliefs and preventing political lying.

Then again, why should a politician be prevented from lying? It is the basis of their job.