Fighting untrustworthy Internet content: In search of regulatory scenarios

Abstract

The question of liability for the consequences of misleading information on the Internet is deeply problematic. The information chain can be long and pass through several jurisdictions en route from information supplier to information consumer. Organisations along the chain, such as ISPs, which attempt to provide quality or reliability checks, are inhibited from so doing by potential liabilites if they make public statements about their filtering policy. Self regulation would seem to offer one possible solution, but here too there are difficulties in both enforcement and with bodies which are outside the self regulatory environment. These problems are discussed and some proposals are put forward as to how self regulation could be made more effective and provide a greater degree of assurance to the consumer of online information.