STRASBOURG (FRANCE) - The European Parliament on Tuesday adopted controversial copyright reforms championed by news publishers and the music business, delivering a blow to the tech giants that lobbied furiously against it. Launched in 2016, the revamp to European copyright legislation was seen as urgently needed, not having been updated since 2001, before the birth of YouTube or Facebook. Reda said the vote marked a "dark day for internet freedom" and decried that MEPs refused, albeit narrowly, to modify the text before the final vote. Under the reform, European law for the first time would hold platforms legally responsible for enforcing copyright, requiring them to check everything that their users post to prevent infringement. The reform is staunchly backed by France and several other member states, and the vote in the European Parliament might normally have been expected to be a formality.

Source: Bangkok Post March 26, 2019 12:45 UTC