Germany to regulate the Web.

["Peter Trei" <trei@process.com>]

Forwarded from the www-security list. Germany seems to 
want to:

1. Require blocking of German-verboten material.
2. Mandate content labling (PICS?)
3. Ban 'cookies'.
4. Require Digital Signatures on all net traffic. 

-pt
------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
Date:          Sun, 15 Dec 1996 23:48:32 -0800
To:            www-security@ns2.rutgers.edu
Subject:       Germany bans cookies! (and a whole lot more)
From:          nobody@cypherpunks.ca (John Anonymous MacDonald, a remailer node)


web servers within Germany anyway... as of August 97... see below
 
 
               Germany Passes Sweeping Cyberspace Law 

               The German government approved a bill Wednesday aimed at
               regulating the Internet and protecting user privacy while banning
               smut, pro-Nazi content and online fraud. The so-called
               "multimedia law" essentially extends current German laws to the
               dominion of cyberspace, placing responsibility for suspect
               content on suppliers, but without clearly defining whether a
               supplier could also be construed to make a carrier -- such as an
               online service like CompuServe or AOL Bertelsmann Online --
               also liable. 

               The law is scheduled to take effect in August 1997, prior to the
               1998 deregulation of the European telecommunications market. 

               Under the law, online services could be held responsible for
               illegal material if they have the technology to block transmission
               of such content, and after notification, still disseminate the
               objectionable content. 

               The law also calls for content to be tagged electronically if
               unsuitable for minors to ensure it could be filtered out --similar
               to the V-chip television initiative in the U.S. The law would also
               prohibit "cookies" -- tiny programs that trace a user's path
               through the Net, recording what they visit, examine and
               purchase. Instead, the law would require that services give users
               the opportunity to use a site or service anonymously. 

               The German law also puts into place the idea of so called "digital
               signatures" -- a string of coded information which would clearly
               identify the origin of messages, files and images shipped via the
               Net. Such signatures would use a central authority to prevent
               fraudulent commercial transactions on the computer network by
               matching a publicly accessible data string with a confidential
               string of numbers, also called a key. 

www.mediacentral.com/Magazines/MediaDaily/Archive/1996121207.html/634827