Italian Prosecutors Seek Prison Sentences For Google Execs 197
angry tapir writes "Milan prosecutors have sought prison sentences ranging from six months to one year for four Google executives accused of violating Italy's privacy laws over the posting of a video showing the bullying of a handicapped teenage boy. The prosecutor's request was backed up by a request by lawyers representing the Milan city council for €300,000 (US$452,000) in moral and material damages. The case concerns the posting on Google Video of a three-minute mobile-phone video showing a handicapped boy being tormented by his classmates in a Turin school."
A lesson to Google (Score:4, Interesting)
I hope this serves as a lesson to companies who seem to want the best of all worlds. I'm kind of glad that google is getting hit with this because it brings to light the problem with trying to cater to the demands of local governments. When Google began working with governments in foreign jurisdictions it opened the door to this type of activity.
Google would have a much more stable leg to stand on if they simply said 'We are a US company, we will follow US laws.' when China asked them to tailor GoogleChina to meet the party demands.
Similar to safe harbor protections when it comes to ISPs, if you 'fly the flag' of a specific country on the Internet, you are bound by that country's laws. That doesn't mean that the local governments can't block your service, but it should serve as protection when local governments attempt to apply their laws to a foreign company.
Re:Ironic (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know where you found this info, and I never heard anything about it (and I actually have born and live in Torino). Also there are no "cliffs" around Torino, and Torino has nevere been a citystate in ancient times: in fact it was born as a Roman military camp.
Google should black list them (Score:3, Interesting)
They should just blacklist blocks of IPs used by Italian law enforcement and legislature for a few weeks from all of Google's services. The Italian government might be able to arrest them if they visit Italy, but Google can deal with them if they go on the Internet.
Re:I'm sure glad (Score:1, Interesting)
that those Italian prosecutors are going after the really guilty parties instead of the little, misguided tykes who perpetrated the incident.
They are going after the company that embarrassed the city publicly. BTW, everybody understands the problem here except for a few Americans.
I am Italian - It's not about bullies. (Score:2, Interesting)
This has nothing to do with the bullies or who uploaded the video but rather our corrupt politicians and their never ending fear of the Internet as a mean for free expression and communications. A few months ago they even made a law proposal for taking restrictive measures (no anonimity), officially to protect children, but the freely downloadable document metadata of the law proposal contained the address of the president of the Italian union of audiovisual publishers. So much for protecting children! That would have been laughable if it wasn't real, sadly it is.
Feel free to search for the Carlucci Law proposal, from the name of Gabriella Carlucci, another -just guess- ex showgirl turned into a politician by that criminal bastard named Silvio Berlusconi.