Bonnici seeks to reassure critics: ‘Online registration is for editors’

A Media and Defamation Act currently up for consultation has sparked fears of attempts by the government to “stifle internet freedom by forcing citizen-owned websites” by asking ‘editors’ to register with a Media Registrar.

The Media Registrar refers to the registration of “an editor or a publisher of a newspaper or the editor of a website or broadcasting service”. In the outdated 1974 Press Act, this was referred to as the “Registrar” and covered newspapers and broadcasting mediums.

The concern that the registration would also force the public at large to register their name arose from the Bill’s proposed definition of website, which was defined as: “any web-based news service or other web-based service relating to news or current affairs that operates from Malta or in respect of which editorial decisions are taken in Malta”.

Likewise, the draft Bill describes an editor as “the person registered as editor […] and includes any person responsible for the publication of information, ideas or images on a website […]. (The 1974 Press Act described the editor as “the person responsible for the publication of any printed matter […].”)

The legal wording gave rise to a series of questions of how news websites should be defined: What constitutes news? And what are current affairs? Should there even be attempts to regulate online?

Justice Minister Owen Bonnici has insisted that there’s no intention – be it direct or indirect – for citizens to registers themselves to “be able to comment online”.

“This is a deceptive spin of the opposition,” he said in a statement issued through the Department of Information.

Bonnici insisted that the law was “simply” proposing to have editors of local news services and online current affairs to register, “just like newspaper editors do”.

The minister added that consultation on the draft law was still underway and “any observations and suggestions are most welcome”.

The Malta Information Technology Law Association has strongly opposed the registration arguing that it was “a direct curtailment to freedom of speech online”.

“The Internet is a bastion of activity and free expression – registration will put this under government control,” MITLA argued. It also opposed proposed rules that, after three months of inactivity, the registration of the website with the registrar would be nullified.

“Such obligations are unprecedented in modern democratic societies,” the association said.

Likewise, the PN has argued that online should be treated differently from the ‘traditional’ mediums.

"The truth is that the Internet is vastly different from newspapers, and that the dissemination of information online cannot be compared with information found on newspapers,” PN deputy leader Mario de Marco told a press conference.

“The Internet is a world in and of itself and we must recognize that fact. We cannot use tools of the past to regulate realities of the present.”

De Marco warned that people who blog about current affairs should not be considered as editors, arguing that this would equate them with traditional newspapers.

He added that the problem was exacerbated by the vagueness of the proposed legal definition of website.

The Institute of Maltese Journalists has yet to comment on the Bill, and is currently in the process of collating feedback ahead of a meeting with Bonnici and Education Minister Evarist Bartolo.

The Media and Defamation Act 2017 also seeks to ban precautionary warrants, the removal of criminal libel against journalists and the introduction of mediation in cases of civil libel.

It does not attempt to define what a journalist is – which according to the Council of Europe could be anyone who is regularly or professionally engaged in the collection and dissemination of information to the public via any means of mass communication.