France
US threatens France with massive $2.4 billion tariffs if country proceeds with “burdensome” US tech giant tax
The US isn’t happy with the idea and is prepared to respond.
European Commission severely criticizes France’s impossible “hate speech” laws, freezes the bill
The bill is dead on arrival.
Students in France to be taught about bitcoin and cryptocurrencies as part of the curriculum
It’s not yet known whether they’ll be taught about bitcoin in a positive or negative way.
Police in Europe seize Share-Online.biz in piracy raid, taking it offline
The server has been shut down after different raids in Germany, France, and the Netherlands.
France’s national face ID database is coming sooner than expected
How all of this will sit with the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is yet to be seen.
France wants to analyze users’ Facebook profiles and data to find tax fraud
Macron’s government has now moved forward with a proposal that has been sent to France’s parliament, which will open a debate on the draft in mid-October.
French High Court rules against Steam, says the company must allow the resale of game licenses
The High Court of Paris (abbreviated TGI, in English) ruled in favor of this French consumers union on September 17, which main criticism stems from the fact that Valve defines Steam purchases as subscriptions for content and services.
Wikipedia is down, experiencing sustained DDoS attack
A “massive and very” broad DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack is hitting the Wikimedia Foundation servers
France to combine anti-piracy agency with media regulator
France is still focusing its energy on stomping out any sharing, aka piracy, taking place online by enforcing more government regulation.
Chinese-style social media censorship is increasingly influencing Western platforms
Chinese-style social media censorship – coming to a Western democracy near you.
US refuses to sign France’s G7 online “hate speech” pledge
US social media companies had already delayed signing the pledge on Friday.
US social media companies delay signing France “hate speech” pledge
A senior Trump administration said some of the social media companies felt “bullied by France to join.”