The Webfather

A recent case in Italy has suggested that all blogs are likely to be illegal in Italy. Bloggers could be subject to a fine or some time in jail for not registering as publications.

The Italian constitution guarantees the right to freedom of speech at Article 21. According to third party sources, following world war two, there was a concern among Italian legislators that publications which abused this right could have a significant impact on the Italian populace. It was therefore decided to have all publishers register centrally before being allowed to produce a publication or they would be guilty of the offence of 'clandestine publication' (article 16 of Law 47).

This law was expressly stated to apply to the internet in a 2001 statute, Law 62. Recently Sicilian historian Carlo Ruta was censured under this law for producing a 'clandestine publication' on his blog. Mr Ruta was writing a blog about connections between the mafia and politics, hadn't notifed the authorities that he was publishing, and was therefore guilty of this offence.

I'm no Italian lawyer, but this seems to open the very real prospect of Italian bloggers being required to register centrally as a publication (with all the red tape this involves) or risk a fine or imprisonment for blogging. If Naked Law ever visits Italy, it had better like prison food.....