The European Union is working on reforming the copyright by forcing websites to enable “upload filters” and to pay for linking to other websites.
One of the biggest issues with the new EU copyright reform proposal is the Article 13, which mandates that websites that accept user content (anything from videos to online comments) must have an “upload filter” that would block all copyrighted content that's uploaded by users. Critics, such as Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Julia Reda, have also called upload filters “censorship machines.”
Under the censorship machine proposal, companies would be required to get a license for any copyrighted content that is uploaded to their site by its users. In other words, websites would be liable for any content their users upload to the site.
Some argue that upload filters wouldn’t be able to recognize “legal uses” of copyrighted content, even if they were 100% effective in identifying whether or not a piece of content is copyrighted or not. In this category would enter parodies and citations, which typically make references to licit copyrighted content.
It is disputed if uploading filters is legal or if it violates fundamental rights to privacy, freedom of expression, freedom of information and freedom to conduct a business.
Another article under dispute is the so called “link tax” proposal in Article 11 of the copyright reform directive is another idea that’s not just seemingly bad, but it has also failed in countries such as Spain and Germany, where it has already been attempted. Instead of getting companies such as Google or other publishers to pay for the links, or article excerpts and previews, those companies simply stopped linking to content coming from Germany and Spain.
Critics believe that a link tax would significantly reduce the number of hyperlinks we see on the web, which means websites will be much less connected to each other.
These two articles seem to be the most controversial by far and critics believe that the directive would probably have a negative impact on companies