op-ed by Arthur Messaud

7th of November 2018 - Last week, we explained that decentralizing the web would bring hope to organize our online exchanges democratically, to counter the hegemony of the online attention economy. Indeed, the GAFAMs are distorting our exchanges for economical reasons while propounding hateful, caricatural, violent or even paid statements... to the detriment of others. This must be fixed.

Paris, 1 June 2017 — On the first anniversary of the adoption of the EU regulation on the Open Internet which governs the aspects of Net neutrality, and as the ARCEP (French Telco regulator) publishes its first report on the state of the Internet, we paint a dark picture of its implementation in France and within the EU.

Paris, 30 August 2013 — For the past 3 years, a consortium led by Alcatel-Lucent has been working on technical, business and legal aspects of a plan that would effectively put an end to the free and open Internet we enjoy today. Under the guise of protecting Net neutrality, EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes is about to give these big telecom companies a EU-wide legal shield to achieve their power-grab on the Internet economy, as confirmed by a new leaked EU Commission document. Such a shocking instance of corporate policy capture would have disastrous effects for freedom and innovation online.

Paris, 19 July 2013 — Since last week, after citizen groups started criticizing the EU Commission over its leaked draft regulation threatening to kill Net neutrality, Commissioner Neelie Kroes and her staff have tried to defend their proposal on Twitter, arguing that these criticisms were “misleading European citizens”. Here is a summary of what was said, not said, and how it reveals that these criticisms are absolutely right.

This analysis is a part of a series.

Paris, 22 May 2013 — When you are browsing the web, can you say who collects information about you, what is the nature of that information and who may access it? Can you control who may know what about you? The European Commission intended to give you the power to do so, but European Parliament may vote otherwise, under pressure by corporate lobbies.

Paris, 7 May 2013 — For more than a year, the EU Parliament have been examining the Proposal for a Regulation of the EU Commission aimed at reforming the European data protection legal framework. Until now, the parliamentary committees examining the Proposal have so far proposed to restrict the protections of our fundamental right to privacy. As a crucial vote is approaching1 in the “Civil Liberties” (LIBE) Committee, La Quadrature du Net launches a series of analysis dealing with key points, stakes, development and threats of the reform.

• 1. The LIBE committee vote was scheduled for 29-30 May but should finally take place before the end of June.