Facebook Users Must Be Allowed To Use Pseudonyms, Says German Privacy Regulator; Real-Name Policy ‘Erodes Online Freedoms’ Facebook’s thorny relationship with Europe and European lawmakers took another barb in the side yesterday as a German Data Protection Commissioner issued a ruling that Facebook’s real-name policy violates German Law.
The data protection body, called Unabhaengiges Landeszentrum fuer Datenschutz (ULD, aka the Office of the Data Protection Commissioner) which operates in the Northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein, said Facebook’s policy of mandating users of its social network use their real names, with no provision permitting “pseudonymous accounts”, violates the German Telemedia Act (TMG) — section 13, part 6 of which states The service provider must enable the use of telemedia and payment for them to occur anonymously or via a pseudonym where this is technically possible and reasonable.
Facebook given 72 hours to remove paedophile monitoring page. 30 November 2012Last updated at 12:11 ET A convicted sex offender has won a High Court order for the removal of a Facebook page set up to monitor paedophiles in Northern Ireland.
A judge ruled some content amounted to prima facie harassment of the man and risked infringing his human rights. Facebook was given 72 hours to take down the page 'Keeping our kids safe from predators'. Facebook censorship.
Facebook Lobbying.