After Berlusconi Attack, Italy Considers Web Censorship

An anonymous reader writes "The Italian government has proposed introducing new restrictions on the Internet after a Facebook fan page for the man who allegedly attacked Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Sunday drew almost 100,000 users in under 48 hours. However, the planned clampdown on Internet hate speech sparked a heated debate over censorship and freedom of expression, leading Interior Minister Roberto Maroni to execute a partial U-turn."

If this were a nobody that was attacked

[rolfwind]

The government would treat it just like any other case, even with such a facebook group.

It never ceases to amaze me how the government uses high-profile cases to grab at power and suppress the people while having their whole-hearted support of such measures. The patriot act comes to mind. (Which, btw, did nothing to stop Nidal Hasan from killing people.)

These type of things shows you the true stripes of those in power, and who should be voted out ASAP.

Re:If this were a nobody that was attacked

[FinchWorld]

The patriot act comes to mind. (Which, btw, did nothing to stop Nidal Hasan from killing people.)

Dear Citizen,

The Patriot Act was infact a great help it stopping Nidal Hasan from killing more people than he did! Infact, if we allow full wiretapping, remove all that paperwork that gets in the way of stopping police from stopping and searching you, as well as any probable cause requirements involved, this would never have happenned! It just turns out the soft liberal types, who are first to defend cartoon depictions of child pornography, obviously direct support for paedophiles I might add, which prevents us from keeping you safe from terrorists (You do remember 9/11 right?).

Our inability to stop and hold suspects without probable cause gives them time to destroy all evidence of there terrorist or paedophilic activities! This is why it is vital to detain them imediately so that such evidence can be found, and justice served! Won't you please think of the children?

Signed, Your bought Politician.

For those interested they can already do this in the UK, US I'm not so sure.

Re:Control

[emanem]

Il Giornale
Libero (his ex-wife controls it but de-facto he is)
Oggi
Chi

Re:Control

[Anonymous Coward]

He owns Il Giornale, via his brother Paolo. Il Foglio, it is owned by his recently divorcing wife. Mondadori, the biggest italian publisher, with a myriad of magazines, is in the hands of his daughter Marina. About the latter, he has just been sentenced guilty of taking over Mondadori by means of corruption back in 1990 and will have to pay 750 megaeuros. Mediaset is controlled by Piersilvio, his son, and owns 3 private national channels out of 7 plus a bunch of digital tv channels. Other than these, are the three national tv channels of RAI (state television) which is mostly controlled by the government.
If this is not enough, well... unfortunely he has way much more power than this...

by the way
what do ./ers think of the aggression itself? I mean... is it possible to have two broken teeth, broken nose, and a white shirt with no red stain?

That's already in place.

[VincenzoRomano]

In Italy you are not allowed to reach some international websites, mainly related to betting.
You get directed to a generic web page (hosted at the government company SOGEI Spa [wikipedia.org]) that says that you are not allowed to visit those websites.
If you are in Italy you can try http://www.ladbrokes.com/ [ladbrokes.com] or http://www.skybet.com/ [skybet.com].
Can you spell "freedom" in Italian? We cannot.

Re:Control

[emanem]

You missed the point sit. In Italy they don't sell many newspapers...btw he does control 35% of the biggest newspaper (Il Corriere) as well..
Anyway the majority of information is broadcast through TV which he controls (50% as prime minister) and owns (50% his own TV stations).
You sir, don't know what you're talking about.

Re:Control

[emanem]

Btw sorry I got confused... he owns so many... :-P
Libero is owned by his brother Paolo
Il Foglio is owned by his ex-wife
and he owns (through his publishing company) ona of the biggest quotes of Il Corriere (the most famous italian newspaper)...

The train of thought

[Balau]

It goes on like this:
-Berlusconi was attacked by Mr.Tartaglia because he hated him.
-The attack was caused by the hateful mood (http://www.ansa.it/web/notizie/rubriche/politica/2009/12/15/visualizza_new.html_1646244271.html/ [www.ansa.it])
-Facebook is full of political hatred (http://www.ilgiornale.it/interni/su_facebook_tartaglia_eroe_chi_odia/tartaglia-facebook-berlusconi/13-12-2009/articolo-id=406674-page=0-comments=1/ [ilgiornale.it])
-Facebook is on the Internet
-The solution is to control Facebook, and also the whole Internet to avoid mistakes (http://www.repubblica.it/2009/12/sezioni/politica/giustizia-22/rodota/rodota.html/ [repubblica.it])

Re:That's already in place.

[I'm_Original]

I am in Italy right now, and I didn't know there was any censorship. I tried those two sites, and you're right, they are in fact censored, with a notice referencing the law that brought the censorship into place. Thank you.