UN Planning to Criminalize So-Called “Misinfo” That Causes “Social Disorder,” “Hatred”

The United Nations has started a new initiative. “counter the use of information and communications technologies” For “criminal purposes,” This appears to apply to individuals who share. “misinformation.”

Private companies, including social media platforms such as Facebook’s parent company Meta, are also involved in the venture.

Drafts of the Convention reveal that UN might criminalize positions that promote “hatred” – including “ideological” And “political” – in addition to the vague term “extremism.” The Chinese Communist Party submitted also proposals to criminalize sharing of information that results in “social disorder.”

This effort started in December 2019, when the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution calling on the UN to implement the Resolution. formulation Convention on Countering the Use of Information and Communications Technologies to Criminal Purposes. Currently, an Ad Hoc committee is working on details – including member states, jurisdiction, and focus areas – for the convention, which will be formalized in September 2024.

Although the UN Conventions currently address information and communication technologies in a broad sense, the pending UN convention will be the first one to specifically address these communications methods within the context of “criminal purposes.”

What is it exactly? “criminal purposes,” However, this definition is still vague and does not include people who spread the word. “misinformation.”

The best recent draft of the convention’s objectives and scope explains how the UN is working with countries to “promote, facilitate and strengthen international cooperation in preventing and combating the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes,” This includes compelled countries to adopt. “legislative and other measures as are necessary to establish” Certain online actions are considered unacceptable “offence under domestic law.”

Simply put, the UN could force governments to adopt policies that define what constitutes sovereignty. “criminal” Information shared by citizens

Article 26, for example, of the draft document calls on countries to adopte ”legislative and other measures“ to criminalize individuals who engage in sharing content that promotes “subversive or armed activities directed towards the violent overthrow of the regime of another State.”

Article 27 is similarly vague. It focuses on “extremism-related offences,” Which it defines as “the distribution of materials that call for illegal acts motivated by political, ideological, social, racial, ethnic or religious hatred, the advocacy and justification of such acts.”

The UN may appear to be justified in trying to curb certain forms of speech, but it is not clear what the UN considers acceptable. “subversive” Promotion of posts “political” Or “ideological hatred” Could be used to target content that is critical of the far-left and globalist agendas of groups such as the UN or World Economic Forum (WEF).

Article 29 in the draft document, for example, focuses on “terrorism-related offences,” Calling on countries to criminalize the commissioning, inciting or recruitment of terrorism, which it defines “spreading of strife, sedition, hatred or racism.”

The Ad Hoc Committee responsible Representatives from the private sector were also involved in the formulation of the details of the convention.

Participants include Amazon Web Services, Inc., the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America, Facebook’s parent company Meta, and Microsoft.

Chinese Communist Party-run entities, such as the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies or Beijing Normal University, have been involved in deliberations.

INTERPOL has also participated In a discussion regarding the scope of convention, it was claimed that “prominent threats” The body must confront include “misinformation.”

The Chinese Communist Party also tries to influence the outcome of the convention, adding a proposal that would criminalize spreading information “that could result in serious social disorder.”

The complete text of the proposal is:

“Each State Party shall adopt such legislative and other measures as may be necessary to establish as criminal offenses, when committed intentionally and unlawfully, the publishing, distributing, transmitting, or otherwise making available of false information that could result in serious social disorder, including but not limited to information related to natural and human-caused disasters, by means of [a computer system] [an information and communications technology system/device];”