German judges and state prosecutors need to crack down straight away on fake news disseminated through social media platforms such as Facebook, Germany's Justice Minister Heiko Maas said in an interview published on Sunday.
Maas, a Social Democrat in conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition, has repeatedly warned the U.S. technology company to respect laws against defamation in Germany that are more rigid than in the United States. He told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper the principle of free speech did not protect against slander.
"Defamation and malicious gossip are not covered under freedom of speech," Maas said, just days after other top government officials called for legislation to tackle "hate speech" and fake news on Facebook and other social media platforms.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ge...-idUSKBN1470CN
Unlike the OP, it seems that the ever logical Germans are able to recognize what fake news is and isn't.
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