The EU took the word "filters" out of the Copyright Directive, but it's still all about filters

Some drafts of Article 13 of the pending EU Copyright Directive no longer contain the word "filters" -- because the world's leading technical, legal and human rights experts all say these will lead to widespread censorship of legitimate, noninfringing materials.

But it doesn't take a lot of work to understand that the Directive still mandates filters. In a nutshell, if you demand that, say, Youtube must vet all of the 300 hours of new video it receives every minute to ensure it doesn't infringe copyright, with massive penalties for letting even a single frame of infringing material through, there just isn't any other conceivable way to even approximate that, apart from filters.

And of course, the proposal has been about filters from the start. The fact that the word "filter" has been removed from MEP Axel Voss's latest text doesn't change that -- nor do unconvincing phrases about avoiding filters or not clobbering legitimate materials. The entertainment corporations (and not regular users) have all the power in this system, and if platforms have to choose between risking the wrath of a kid whose school project was unfairly censored, or Universal or Disney, the kid is going to be out of luck.

After many Twitter debates with apologists for Article 13, I've summarised and rebutted all their arguments in a post for EFF's Deeplinks: "Yes, the EU's New #CopyrightDirective is All About Filters."

7. The Directive does not adequately protect fair dealing and due process

Some drafts of the Directive do say that EU nations should have "effective and expeditious complaints and redress mechanisms that are available to users" for "unjustified removals of their content.