1 How ‘Liberty’ Disappeared from Cyberspace: The Mystery Shopper Tests Internet Content Self-Regulation Christian Ahlert, Chris Marsden and Chester Yung Table of Contents Introduction............................................................................................................................................................. 2 Internet Industry and the Role of ISPs ............................................................................................................... 3 Liability for Harmful and Potentially Illegal Content on the Internet ........................................................... 5 Overview of the Notice and Takedown (NTD) procedure.................................................................................. 7 Legal provisions of NTD in the US and EU .......................................................................................................... 8 ISP Codes of Conduct and Notice and Takedown......................................................................................... 12 ISP Market and Regulatory Cost-Benefits ........................................................................................................ 13 How Much NTD Activity? Results of a Questionnaire Survey in the Netherlands .................................. 15 The Mystery Shopper Test ....................................................................................................................................... 17 Objectives ............................................................................................................................................................... 17 Design and schedule............................................................................................................................................. 17 Result of the pilot experiment: US ISP .................................................................................................................. 19 US Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................................... 23 UK Test .................................................................................................................................................................. 24 Preliminary Conclusion: US vs UK ................................................................................................................... 26 Policy Conclusions ..................................................................................................................................................... 27 References................................................................................................................................................................... 29 Appendix I—Questionnaire on Notice and Take Down Procedure................................................................ 31 Appendix II—Overview several ISPs in the UK ................................................................................................. 34 Thus-plc-Demon Internet .............................................................................................................................. 34 Freeserve.com ................................................................................................................................................... 35 AOL Europe ..................................................................................................................................................... 36 POPTEL ........................................................................................................................................................... 37 Which? Online .................................................................................................................................................. 38 Fastnet International ....................................................................................................................................... 38 Yahoo!UK ......................................................................................................................................................... 39