Starting Thursday, July 7, Japan will be criminalizing online insults. Those who will be caught will face a year in prison. Those convicted will also be fined up to 300,00 yen or $2,200.
Previously, posting online insults in Japan was only punishable by up to 30 days in prison and up to a 10,000 yen fine or $75.
Japan to Criminalize Online Insults
According to The Verge, the law will be reexamined in three years to see if it has any negative impact on the country's freedom of expression, which is a concern that critics of the bill raised.
However, the Japanese government said that the bill was necessary to lessen cyberbullying in the country.
Seiho Cho, a criminal lawyer in Japan, told CNN that the bill did not clarify what counts as an insult and what doesn't.
The law says that the insult means "demeaning someone without a fact about them, unlike defamation which classifies as demeaning someone while pointing to a fact about them.
Cho said that at the moment, even if someone online calls the leader of Japan names like "idiot," then under the revised law, that could be classed as an insult.
Japanese officials have pushed a crackdown on cyberbullying after the suicide of reality TV star Hana Kimura, who was subject to online abuse and harassment.
Kimura's mother pushed for more anti-cyberbullying policies after her death. Some research shows a relationship between suicidal thoughts and behaviors and cyberbullying, though most research has been done on children and teenagers.
UK's Similar Move
Aside from Japan, the United Kingdom also has laws criminalizing offensive public posts. People have been arrested and fined for tweets that have been tagged as harassment and online abuse.
The language in its policies is also very vague, and courts decide what counts as offensive on a case-by-case basis.
In February, Joseph Kelly, a 36-year-old man from Castlemilk, Glasgow, was found guilty of sending a grossly offensive tweet about Captain Sir Tom Moore.
Capt. Moore was a British army officer who raised money for the UK's National Health Service by walking 100 laps around his garden before his 100th birthday.
On Feb. 3, the day after Moore died, Kelly posted a tweet saying that Moore was not a good person and that he should "burn." He was found guilty in March and was ordered to do 150 hours of community service, according to New York Post.
Kelly's case surprised many internet users in the UK, even those in the United States, where robust free speech laws, such as the First Amendment, protect all types of public speech against government prosecution.
The United Kingdom has long held different standards and, for 20 years, has prosecuted internet users for offensive messages and posts under legislation known as the 2003 Communications Act.
Section 127 of the Communications Act in the UK makes it an offense to send public messages of a "grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character," which is a broad remit.
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Written by Sophie Webster
