Mrs. Macovei, what is your opinion and the opinion of the EP group European Conservatives and Reformists on the Directive for Copyright in the Digital Single Market?

I now speak for myself: some provisions of the proposed text are posing threats to the open web and to the very existence of independent media organizations. This is why I took the initiative to send an open letter to my colleagues in the Parliament explaining in detail the problematic articles (11 and 13) kindly asking to either delete these articles on the 20th of June, during the next JURI Committee voting session (the ones that are members of this Committee) or during the plenary vote (if everything goes according to the plan scheduled for September, this year). With regards to the political groups in the European Parliament one should know that in all groups, ECR included, there are representatives of several different countries, having various expertise and views. In spite of that, there is a large consensus within the ECR that Art 11 of the Directive should be deleted, for instance.

There are number of critics of the Directive and Article 13 and 11 there.

Do you think there is something wrong and unlawful? As Art 11 could breach the fundamental rights, Art 13 undermines legal certainty for journalists, professors and the European businesses, and imposes censorship filters. The citizens invested their trust in us and we have to work and decide in their benefit. We need to create steady and clear legal rules allowing the free development of individuals and society, the innovation and creativity, and to effectively support investigative journalists whose fight against corruption, organized crime and terrorism financing is impressive and vital. At present, the independent investigative journalism outlets reference their sources and therefore they link to published facts.

If Art 11 will be adopted, journalists would not easily be able to refer immediately to published sources, or even worse, they might not receive the copyright agreement or would have to pay for it. There is, in this case, a huge risk of destroying independent media, leading to censorship and death of local or small publishers. Moreover, it would prevent tracking past events, aggregating information and reveal unlawful businesses. On the other hand, there are also cconsequences on the society: the essential role of fighting against corruption, organized trans-border crime, money laundering and terrorism would thereby be severely undermined. Future discoveries such as Lux, Panama, Paradise Paper, Azeri Laundromat would become difficult, “La Piovra” of money laundering could remain unknown in the future and criminals might go unpunished. The crucial watchdog role of media questioning those in power will be weakened.

Public access to quality information would become more difficult, affecting the core of democracy. We are living hard times when our democracies could be undermined by disinformation. We are living in the “fake news” era. As a responsible politician, I do not want to introduce obstacles to quality reporting and investigative journalism.

On Article 13. This will impose a sort of Censorship Machine.

This changes the liability regime making websites responsible for their users’ activities. This contradicts both the e-Commerce Directive and the European jurisprudence (Scarlet/Sabam C-70/10 and Netlog/ Sabam C-360-10) where the Court of Justice of the EU found that ordering an Internet service provider to install a system of filtering of all electronic communications and blocking certain content in order to protect intellectual property rights was in breach of European law. Consequences for users? The proposed filters would scan each piece of content (videos, audio, texts, snippets, screenshots, memes….) uploaded by users to all online platforms. The algorithms that will scan the information are not be able to differentiate between alleged copyright infringements and legitimate use of content allowed by law. The remix and reuse of data to create new content will be no longer possible. Professors will not be able to create new learning resources based on existing materials.

Users will not be able to freely express themselves for example by creating parodies and caricatures by using already publicly available images on the internet. This will lead to a severe violation of the freedom of online expression and ban on creativity. At the same time, it will likely lead to over enforcement by private companies, more worried about being sued for copyright infringements than by not allowing legal content to be uploaded. The proposed “redress mechanism” from the Directive will quite obviously not work, because internet companies will simply categorize their deletions as terms of service violations, making it irrelevant whether the content was infringing or not.

The EU shows that there is a certain need of a new copyright regulation? How should the new reform look like?

The producers, artists, musicians or creators needs to have their copyrights protected. This is out of the question. But not at the cost of the public access to news and information. A free flow of information is vital for democracy and this is why sharing of news and information should not be restricted. The copyright reform should not harm the free and honest journalists and not exacerbate existing power asymmetries in media markets that already suffer from worrying levels of concentration in many Member States. The neighboring right should be replaced by a less invasive, more proportionate legal solution.

What is the next step for the Directive? When can we expect the next big decision about the it?

This is still uncertain but let’s hope for the best. On 20 June my colleagues in JURI Committee are going to vote the Voss report. It is expected the deletion of Art 11 (apparently a majority of the members from various political groups would support this). Regarding Art 13, as far as I know, S&D (The Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats- in other words, the Socialist Group) might challenge the mandate of the rapporteur Axel Voss, which could complicate the things. On 5 July we are going to vote in the plenary on the mandate for the “trilogue”, which is the negotiations between the European Parliament and the Council (Member States) with the Commission as facilitator. So, work and decision making is still ongoing.

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