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Comment by thewebguyd | Hacker News Reader

> On what basis should you be allowed to violate British law when interacting with a British resident?

If all I do is host a website that serves images, and I'm not hosting nor operating out of the UK, why would I be subject to their laws? Just because it's accessible globally means I now have to factor in every possible regulation from around the world?

The burden shouldn't fall on me, the website operator, to block UK traffic because they want to restrict content or enforce age verification. Nor should they be able to fine me. It's up to the UK to have UK based ISPs block my site then.

Obviously a different story if I'm deliberately offering a paid service to UK citizens, or advertising to them, etc.

But to suggest that every website owner now needs to be aware of, and follow, ever nation's unique regulations will spell the death of the internet as a global network.

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> why would I be subject to their laws?

For the same reason that a person under British jurisdiction is subject to its laws. I mean, laws, including British ones, exist for a reason. And usually, that reason isn't "because they're British," and this reason makes sense regarding to non-residents as much as it does to residents.

> Just because it's accessible globally means I now have to factor in every possible regulation from around the world?

Literally. Unfortunately, international laws and international cooperation are not yet sufficiently developed, and extradition requests for such reasons are not a common occurrence yet.

> The burden shouldn't fall on me

The burden doesn't fall on you. That's not how laws work. Laws usually work like this: The British government decides that certain actions are harmful to the UK, and to prevent them, it punishes those who commit them. So, on what basis should you be granted an exception to this logic? These prohibited actions don't become any less harmful to the UK just because they were committed by someone in another jurisdiction.

> Unfortunately, international laws and international cooperation are not yet sufficiently developed, and extradition requests for such reasons are not a common occurrence yet.

Unfortunately? You’d prefer that the owner of a UK pro-LGBT site could be extradited to Uganda over some anti-gay law? Should BBC reporters be sent to the gulag for writing an unfavorable article about Russia?

The fantasy world you’re imagining will literally never happen. You are either absolutely blind to the reality of international relations or you’re trolling. This sort of extraterritorial reach over internet content would be impossible even within the EU (good luck getting Hungary to extradite over UK hate speech laws). It’s simply a non-starter no matter how much you try to claim that it’s “obviously” how things work.

(Edit: I looked at your comment history and found my answer.)

> You’d prefer that the owner of a UK pro-LGBT site could be extradited to Uganda over some anti-gay law?

Ye I wish people did this more often. Looking at the consequences from an external view and also how things can be missused.

The usual response is some handwaiving "obviously it doesn't apply to the outgroup only to the ingroup as I define it don't be silly".

> You’d prefer that the owner of a UK pro-LGBT site could be extradited to Uganda over some anti-gay law? Should BBC reporters be sent to the gulag for writing an unfavorable article about Russia?

Indeed, a good argument against globalization and international law. So yeah, fortunately, international laws and international cooperation are not yet sufficiently developed, and extradition requests for such reasons are not a common occurrence yet.

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