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Ofcom fines 4chan £20K and counting for violating UK's Online Safety Act
- klez 1y agoNote: I had to edit the title because it was too long for HN
- vorpalhex 1y agoWell edited
- whywhywhywhy 1y agoGood luck in trying to collect it.
- klez 1y agoThey should go looking for the Hacker Known as 4chan and collect from him.
- kbelder 1y agoYeah, who is this 'anonymous' fellow?
- jsheard 1y agoI suspect Ofcom knows that 4chan isn't going to comply, they're just going through the motions before deploying the nuclear option of ordering ISPs to block it.
- Froztnova 1y agoSeeing the memes about brits being kicked off the site by their own government might actually be worth a quick visit, lol.
- gossipaddress 1y agoIf the UK doesn't like 4chan, they're going to have to just block it. 4chan, an American product, with likely no funds, is never going to pay this and will suffer zero consequences.
- breakfastduck 1y agowhat a pointless excersize this is
- jerjerjer 1y agoDo they even have any legal presence in UK to fine?
- kulahan 1y agoI assume it's mostly symbolic and/or serving some greater legal purpose.
- arghwhat 1y agoThreatening with prison or a fine of double digit millions of pounds doesn't seem very symbolic.
- general1465 1y agoI mean Russia has fined Google 20 decillion USD. What is the point if you can't collect? Like me fining my neighbor 100 million Euro. He will laugh at me and tell me to get lost. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdxvnwkl5kgo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdxvnwkl5kgo
- arghwhat 1y agoAre you likening the UK to Russia? This is not a fictive fine, it's threats of imprisonment, and ignoring the whole thing means having to avoid travelling to or through the UK for life, and that's assuming the UK doesn't try to activate any sort of extradition agreements. Even without going to prison, that's a permanent and quite significant theft of freedom of movement. If you ever travel abroad, you could end up accidentally booking a transfer through the UK. No one ends up unintentionally transferring through Russia anytime soon. And likening the legal threats of a foreign nation to a joke from your neighbor makes no sense.
- spookie 1y agoI really fail to see the difference between this and Russia's fine.
- retrac98 1y agoAt this point we need big names to choose to remove their services in the UK so the government gets the message.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- smashah 1y agoimgur did this. Unfortunately, I don't see any site being blocked that will make these shameless gremlins in power let go of their authoritarian control over the public's lives.
- rorylawless 1y agoPresumably the "big names" are able to (or have already) implemented the requirements under the law and have an economic and reputational incentive to comply.
- quamserena 1y agoThe “big names” benefit greatly from having the resources to comply meanwhile smaller companies can’t.
- bendigedig 1y ago[flagged]
- nadermx 1y ago4chan is fighting them as well. https://www.techdirt.com/2025/09/05/when-trolls-take-on-tyrants-4chan-and-kiwi-farms-sue-the-uk-over-extraterritorial-censorship/ https://www.techdirt.com/2025/09/05/when-trolls-take-on-tyra...
- constantius 1y agoThanks for posting, an insightful overview of the ramifications of the Online Safety Act on online freedoms. > Perhaps most troubling, the UK’s approach sets a dangerous precedent for global internet regulation. If every country can claim jurisdiction over any website accessible within its borders, the internet becomes subject to the most restrictive speech laws anywhere in the world. Another interesting point is that the UK could just ban the websites it finds objectionable, but that'd expose them as a censor, so instead the strategy is to basically force those websites to withdraw from the market voluntarily (or comply), which is a much less revolting story to sell to its population.
- owisd 1y agoThe UK already blocks certain websites at the national level, e.g. you can’t access Pirate Bay from a UK ISP, so can’t imagine Ofcom blocking 4chan would cause much consternation among those who aren’t already against the OSA.
- maleldil 1y agoI can access https://thepiratebay.org/index.html https://thepiratebay.org/index.html just fine from Hyperoptic.
- lelandfe 1y agoThis is the same tactic currently taken in the US with pornography age verification laws, btw https://theintercept.com/2024/08/16/project-2025-russ-vought-porn-ban/ https://theintercept.com/2024/08/16/project-2025-russ-vought... First Amendment makes it hard for the government to censor or ban them outright, but onerous child protection requirements gets them to close on their own. Russ Vought: > …you know what happens is the porn company then says, ‘We’re not going to do business in your state.’ Which of course is entirely what we were after, right?
- vorpalhex 1y agoWhat an odd feeling to be rooting for 4chan...
- raxxorraxor 1y agoIf you can stomach vulgarities, i always was the anti-censorship shit test.
- encom 1y agoWhat a colossal waste of time. At this point, just unplug the undersea cables, and turn the UK into a big intranet. It's clearly what Ofcom wants.
- ceayo 1y agoMaybe they can take some inspiration from North-Korea, I heard their intranet is great!
- toyg 1y agoOfcom does what the government tells it to do. And the government does what people tell them to do. You underestimate the popular support for censorship laws in the UK - the country still had a legally-empowered "Board of Film Censors" in 2010...
- deejaaymac 1y agoMy government doesn't seem to be listening to me, did you have yours professionally trained or something?
- doublerabbit 1y ago> did you have yours professionally trained or something? It's rather simple really; the secret is money. Only then can you tame a politician.
- EarlKing 1y agoOne no more tames a politician than one tames a dog. When you stop feeding either their slab of meat, you become their next meal.
- subscribed 1y agoYou just need to donate to the ruling party or pay for the lunch and then you're good. https://www.vice.com/en/article/fujitsu-uk-sues-department-health-simon-blagden-tory-donor/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/fujitsu-uk-sues-department-h...
- pelagicAustral 1y ago4chan will pay in two more weeks
- _imnothere 1y agohuh? what makes you think of that?
- ronsor 1y ago"Two more weeks" is a meme phrase used when an event will never actually happen. For example: "trust the plan! just two more weeks until XYZ" when XYZ will not happen.
- quamserena 1y agoSpecifically it comes from Trump frequently saying “two more weeks” and then nothing ever happens
- estimator7292 1y agoNo
- dekken_ 1y agotomorrow never comes
- rob_c 1y agotomorrow never dies
- kstenerud 1y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ4z0QhD92Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ4z0QhD92Y
- Culonavirus 1y agoOfcom can go of itself.
- DataDaemon 1y agopoor Brits
- sunaookami 1y agoEvery country gets the government it deserves.
- ceayo 1y agothe problem is this is affecting people outside of the UK too...
- rob_c 1y agoNot likely
- rob_c 1y agoThanks for lumping me in with the great unwashed.
- cosmicgadget 1y ago"Why don't Afghani women rise up and overthrow the Taliban? Are they stupid?"
- themafia 1y agoYou can cheat elections with enough money. Excepting that citizens are generally not on an equal footing with their own government. Party politics exist.
- munksbeer 1y agoWe don't have "true democracy" in the UK. There are two main issues: - Votes are not equal. You need to win constituencies to get "a point". If you get enough points, you can form the government. But that means huge parts of sparsely populated areas have votes which count for more than the densely populated parts, where people's votes count for less. - You don't need an overall majority to win "a point". You just need more than every other candidate in that constituency. That means a government can gain absolute majority power with a very low overall vote share. The current government got 34% of the overall votes, yet won the largest government majority in history. And we're trapped with this system, because the main parties won't let us change it. When it was tried, and we had a national referendum on it, they rigged the vote in their favour by only offering a complicated and relatively crap alternative and spent our money on propaganda like this: https://politicaladvertising.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/no-to-av-soldier.jpg https://politicaladvertising.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/0... I love the UK in so many ways, but sometimes it makes it very hard to love.
- rarisma 1y agoexercise in futility
- gadders 1y agoI think the end state of this will be when Trump links prosecutions like this to tariff deals, and Kier Starmer will have to choose between mean words on the internet or further damage to an economy in already bad shape.
- observationist 1y agoStarmer doesn't have very long, and he seems to be trying to accelerate his relocation out of government.
- gadders 1y agoI think he is stuck, like the Prime Minister of France. He has a party that won't tolerate spending cuts of the required scale, and an economy that can't tolerate further tax raises. He also has the charisma of a wet sock, which doesn't help.
- TimorousBestie 1y agoSo another thirty years of Tory rule (or worse) because Labor did a dog that caught the car. Hurray.
- pqtyw 1y agoOr Reform... considering that Conservatives are third in the polls currently. If there were elections now according to the current projections Tories would get less seats than the Liberal Democrats.
- TimorousBestie 1y agoYeah, I consider Reform worse.
- jen20 1y agoStarmer has longer than Trump all things being equal - he doesn't even need to call an election until July 5th 2029. He also has a massive majority, making a government collapse by other means highly unlikely.
- bfkwlfkjf 1y agoDo members of parliament also need to provide their IDs when they want to jerk off?
- rob_c 1y agoUnder the UK goodness knows in principle yes but they have a protected status in terms of id and tax history (I, wish I was joking) which makes it problematic enough to even discuss...
- toyg 1y agoYes, but we pay for their VPN: https://www.tomsguide.com/computing/vpns/nordvpn-is-the-most-popular-vpn-amongst-uk-politicians-but-theyre-not-getting-the-best-deals https://www.tomsguide.com/computing/vpns/nordvpn-is-the-most...
- foofoo12 1y agoThink of all the kompromat VPN services could have.
- kijin 1y agoPerhaps this whole ofcom business is the result of foreign VPN companies lobbying to increase market penetration in the UK? Because they're the only ones who are profiting from this fiasco! /s
- sanitycheck 1y agoAll the normie podcasts now falsely advertising VPNs as panaceæ for every possible security problem are cashing in too.
- general1465 1y agoIt could be better - like with Chat Control where politicians and other important persons are exempt.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- amiga386 1y agoReminder that Google owes Russia more money than exists in the world, for continuing to disobey the Russian law which commands them to allow the Russian state to upload its propaganda on Youtube. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxvnwkl5kgo https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdxvnwkl5kgo Ofcom are basically the UK's Roskomnadzor. Tell them to go fuck themselves with a copy of the OSA. I'm from the UK and would gladly fuck all of them with a copy of the OSA, but I'd rather that the law were repealed. In the meantime, I'm telling everyone how to use VPNs and Tor Browser, and to never give anyone their real identity details on the internet.
- linuxftw 1y agoMany people are saying this is symbolic and cannot be enforced. Unfortunately, that's just not true. Look at what happened to the founder of Telegram. Some jurisdiction decides you're violating their laws, all you need to do is catch a connecting flight or take a vacation on their soil or a place that will eagerly extradite, and you're a political prisoner. What happens if one of the officers of 4Chan or Gab is on a flight to Paris and the plane is redirected to London? Well, they're going to prison. The UK is a police state.
- ddalex 1y agoIt has been known that certain middle east countries force passengers crafts to divert and land to get their hands on wanted people
- cma 1y agoI'm pretty sure the US and Europe do this as well, Evo Morales grounding incident: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident
- fair_enough 1y agoI still cannot believe the Geneva Conventions allowed this. This should have ended with John Kerry and Jen Psaki in a Swiss prison for at least 10 years, if not Barack Obama himself. We managed to convict accused war criminals with a lot less evidence in the Nuremburg trials. FOR EMPHASIS: I'm not comparing the severity of the crimes, I'm comparing the evidentiary basis for securing convictions. "It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal." -Henry Kissinger
- ben_w 1y agoThe Geneva Conventions are international humanitarian laws consisting of four treaties and three additional protocols that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war. -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Conventions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Conventions What would those have to do with "intelligence contractor leaked our stuff, might be on the Bolivian president's plane, oh no a diplomatic incident"?
- _imnothere 1y agoHeh, I wonder if it's just like how 4chan anons j?rking off to themselves for the fact that Ofcom sends out pointless fines and sh?t.
- rootsudo 1y agoI was not aware of the main driver, not mentioned, sanctioned suicide even existing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctioned_Suicide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctioned_Suicide
- gadders 1y agoThe people who run that site should be in jail. I think seriously encouraging suicide with details of methods crosses a line.
- lm28469 1y agoNow that they banned discussing suicide online I'm sure the number of suicides will plummet.
- gnfargbl 1y agoYou know, I'd like to actually know the answer to the question you're posing there. Does discussing suicide increase the overall rate, is it neutral -- or does it even decrease it? The Samaritans are usually regarded as a net public benefit, though they tend not to encourage people to go through with it, whereas the Wikipedia link suggests that the users of that forum have some kind of fetish for it. I would also expect to find that the effect of internet was minimal (in my case because I think the drivers of suicide are mostly socioeconomic), but I'd really like to see a proper study. I'm also aware that there is quite a lot of peer-reviewed evidence that pro-anorexia websites do actually cause harm, and there's an obvious parallel to be drawn.
- testdelacc1 1y agoMedia coverage if done irresponsibly can encourage others to do the same. > Research from over 100 international studies provide evidence that the way suicide deaths are reported is associated with increased suicide rates and suicide attempts after reporting [6,7]. > At the same time the WHO also suggests that positive and responsible reporting of suicides which promotes help-seeking behaviour, increases awareness of suicide prevention, shares stories of individuals overcoming their suicidal thinking or promotes coping strategies can help reduce suicides and suicidal behaviour [6,7,8] https://cmhlp.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Resource-2-SPIRIT-Media-Guidelines-for-Reporting-Suicides.pdf https://cmhlp.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Resource-2-SPIR...
- scrlk 1y agoLooks like Hiro will have to cut the salaries of the 4chan jannies to pay the fine.
- robotnikman 1y agoThis is going to end up the same way when Russia fined Google 20 decillion dollars. They won't receive a cent.
- fusslo 1y agoOne interesting bit is that the lawyer, RONALD D. COLEMAN is (or at least was) a youtube lawyer. He'd pop into 'law streams' from time to time to talk about cases and discuss newsworthy events out of the courts. He is as if New Jersey was transmuted into a man (I say that with great affection). I want to say, and I could be wrong, I became familiar with his name during the Rittenhouse trial. Or maybe the couple high profile trials after the Rittenhouse trial, that were popular while we all waited for covid to be 'over'. For whatever that's worth edit: he IS a real lawyer with real clients and real cases. I don't want to diminish anything because I called him a 'youtube lawyer'. I think it's more: A lawyer that sees value in being on youtube from time to time.
- quercusa 1y agoColeman won the 'Slants' case at SCOTUS, so he's the real thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matal_v._Tam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matal_v._Tam https://www.likelihoodofconfusion.com/legal-publications-ron-coleman/slants-redskins-and-other-disparaging-trademarks/ https://www.likelihoodofconfusion.com/legal-publications-ron...
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- ycombinatrix 1y agoArguing a case in front of SCOTUS still means something today?
- antonymoose 1y agoAs a layman, I thought that was a bit of a prestige deal. Is it not?
- johaugum 1y agoSome would say it has lately become a bit of a kangaroo court.
- alphazard 1y agoWhat do they seek to accomplish here? There is strong precedent for the US defending the 1st amendment against foreign interests. No UK bureaucrats are going to make a career out of this. Going after a company that can defend itself and can't be intimidated, will prevent them from bluffing successfully against smaller companies, who could realistically be intimidated. If I were working at Ofcom, I would stay away from the large US sites with access to good legal counsel, and instead try to intimidate the long tail that don't. Totally separate from the issue of whether this is good or bad: it doesn't look like these Ofcom guys are playing with a full deck.
- sleepybrett 1y ago[flagged]
- pqtyw 1y agoPresumably that was a typo since it seemed like a pretty sane commend otherwise.
- SAI_Peregrinus 1y agoYes, I assume they meant "precedent".
- alphazard 1y agoYes, fixed. I often spell both words wrong and click on the spelling suggestion. Autocorrect got me to the wrong one.
- foldr 1y agoI think you’re overanalyzing it. They’re just enforcing the law. You and I may agree that it’s a bad law, but that doesn’t mean that the people in charge of enforcing it necessarily have complex and sinister motives.
- 1y ago
- IlikeKitties 1y agoIs there any way to donate to the defense found here as a non-american non-brit?
- irusensei 1y ago> "Services can no longer ignore illegal content" But that's exactly what 4chan and kiwi farms are doing.
- quamserena 1y agoFor what it’s worth jannies typically remove content that is illegal in the US. What illegal content do you think is on 4chan/kf?
- pessimizer 1y agoI'm not sure why they should care. Just banhammer the entire island. Everybody should. They can have their own independent internet, that conforms to UK laws. Let's see when HN will be fined, for advocacy of circumvention of local laws, or of strong encryption. Facebook banned all Canadian news outlets, and they were probably actually making a few bucks from them. I can't imagine that 4chan would care too much about losing UK users. 4% of barely any revenue, maybe? Just ban them all; they're insignificant. The only drawback for UK citizens is that Reform will go up a point or two in the polls from people who prefer the authoritarianism they don't know to the authoritarianism they do, but considering the awful alternatives it's really six of one a half-dozen of the other. One of the rational reasons people are preferring nationalists is simply because they are less powerful than the neolibs, who all work together against their populations. Better a the dumb local boss you know than a being the local outpost of a faceless world boss.
- ben_w 1y ago> One of the rational reasons people are preferring nationalists is simply because they are less powerful than the neolibs, who all work together against their populations. Better a the dumb local boss you know than a being the local outpost of a faceless world boss. If you think that's rational, you are wrong. Rationalising, sure, just not rational. "Divide and conquer" is very much desired by those who want to control you, and thinking "a local authoritarian for local people" will (or even could) eject the influence of the outside world, is a false narrative. Popular sentiment though, so may well get authoritarian parties some votes.
- naet 1y agoI think if a country is vehemently an international or foreign website it should be on them to block their citizens access, not on website operators to somehow try to geo-restrict that region from access. That could lead to tons of countries having their own internet firewalls similar to China, if that's what they want to do. Which I probably wouldn't like. But the alternative of being liable for any new legislation, fines, etc, from any country in the world just because I operate a small website on the internet seems at least equally bad.
- drnick1 1y agoAt this point every major website and "smart" phone app should just refuse to comply with these idiotic laws and simply block UK users. It's only when the masses realize that the freedoms they care about are being eroded that something will change.
- makerofthings 1y agoThe UK government want to get on with blocking websites and VPNs as soon as possible. 4chan was obviously not going to comply and was picked to allow ofcom to quickly move onto the next step.
- throwaway98743 1y agoCommentators criticising the act and ofcom’s attempt, do understand the online safety act is to prevent children from watching porn? The critique always lacks any form of grounding in reality or proposal of alternative solutions
- dmitrygr 1y agoThere is already a method for that, it is called parenting. Technology never could, cannot, and never will solve problems that are human in nature
- throwaway98743 1y ago^ this is my point. You remove any grounding. We don’t allow children to drink (we allow them younger in the UK than the US), drive, and many other things we have safeguards for. Also, how do you suggest parenting solves for this? Are children with parents all the time? Does the data suggest an only parenting technique works? No, course not. What’s your solution to something that is a problem? All up for a critique of the act but to say “there is no problem” is absurd.
- throwaway98743 1y agoChildren freely watching porn is a technology problem not a not a nature problem
- general1465 1y agoWith this logic we could ban selling knives, because you can use them to kill somebody.
- throwaway98743 1y agoIn the UK you need to be over 18 to buy knives
- general1465 1y agoComplete ban should be enforced, even if it saves a one child, it is worth it.
- jackjeff 1y agoI’d be curious to know how the UK going to enforce its extra territorial law against a company with no ties to the UK?
- gherkinnn 1y agoSemi-related view from a former oldfag (is that term still used?), I am of the firm opinion that Insta and Twitter are far more damaging than 4chan ever was. Not that it doesn't have its filth, of course. But these image boards are too obscure for broad appeal and do not purposefully mess with people's psyche to show them more ads.
- calvinmorrison 1y agoI wrote this years ago about GDPR but it applies here too I don't really oppose gdpr but one of the reasons I vehemently opposed implementing GDPR at my former job is that we were not operating in the EU. Well, we had customers there, but we were an American company operating with American severs. GDPR sets another precident that other countries can make laws about what people from other jurisdictions can do.. Our lawyers said "Do it anyway, just in case". The side effect of these very many different local regulatory bodies is you start trying to comply with multiple laws, some that can conflict each other - and this costs not just time and money, but the rigidity to stand up and say "No, our elected leaders have decided what the laws of the land are, and we follow them". And the thing is, many countries do not have good faith laws. The majority of the people in the world live under what Americans and the EU, and the West would call lacking fundamental human rights. Some of these laws are plain BAD (hell, the US and AU even have our own bad internet laws) and some are EVIL. Google routinely complying with the Chinese government is a great example of them wanting to take the cash first and ask questions later (or not at all). I don't want to work for that company. I don't really think being a good 'worldwide' citizen can exist when there are conflicting views held by governments about what is right. The fact is some governments are objectively etter than others I don't really think we aught to be involving ourselves at all with Russian officals, apparatjiks or other government bodies - but we find ourselves in this situation again, like GDPR, Russian officals have set certain rules about how data for russian citizens needs be held. Of course Russia has no grounds to sue me in America and if it did, do you think a judge would enforce our compliance with laws that hold no water in our countries? Of course not. Russia wants russians data - on russian servers in russia. The fact is they're probably mostly interested in being able to physically seize - without any due process - russian citizens data from servers which all happen to be in russia. It's a smart law if you're interested in putting people in gulags. I'd rather lose all russian customers, and also all of the customers in north korea, or whatever else despotic governments that exist that think they can exert pressure on independent companies who don't operate under their jurisdictions and not have to worry about what bullshit they'll come up with next. None of this to imply that the US and EU, Australia, Switzerland, etcdon't have a bunch of questionable laws and procedures that might not be quite fair or free either, but the world ain't perfect What happens next is country X decides you must do one thing, and country Y decides you do another, and you come to TECHNICAL problems and BUSINESS problems and ETHICAL problems trying to comply with both. If you're not in the EU, do not even bother with GDPR. Rant over
- EasyMark 1y agoDoes 4chan actually get profits from the UK or have offices/servers there? If not how can they do anything to them? Seems like it would be the UK's responsibility to block access to it rather than the inverse if 4chan doesn't have a presence there.
- stormed 1y agoWhat exactly is stopping 4chan from not paying the fines? Is the UK gonna send the cyberpolice to shut down an American website? If your website isn't hosted in the UK you shouldn't have to abide by their laws.