Polish Senate approves content blocking bill

The Polish Senate has approved a bill to block illegal content on the Internet, making a number of amendments to it. It's from sb.by.

According to Polish media, the new rules provide for the ability to quickly execute decisions to block certain illegal content at the request of a prosecutor or police.

One of the amendments passed by the Senate concerns the detection of content related to the use of violence or unlawful threats based on race, national or ethnic origin, religion. This includes threats and harassment on social media or other online platforms. In these cases, decisions will be made by the president of the Office of Electronic Communications or the chairman of the National Broadcasting Council, not the court.

In particularly urgent cases, decisions of the authorities may be enforced immediately. Prosecutors, police, IRS and Border Protection will be able to request swift blocking of content that violates the law, including content related to child sexual abuse, identity theft, fraud or copyright infringement. ISPs, including online platforms, will be required to block content specified in government decisions.

The Senate also passed an amendment introduced by the opposition that reduces the time it takes to present evidence in trials of the most serious crimes subject to immediate enforcement. Online platforms will have 24 hours instead of 14 days. For content writers, the period will be reduced from two days to 24 hours.

In addition, the Senate decided to shorten the period between the announcement of the bill and its entry into force. Instead of the originally scheduled six months, the new rules will come into force in three months.

Earlier, the Ministry of Digital Technologies of Poland prepared draft amendments to the Law on the provision of electronic services and a number of other laws to introduce a procedure that will allow you to quickly issue orders restricting access to illegal content on the Internet.