HateAid CEO Josephine Ballon: ‘Free Speech Needs Boundaries’

ALFONSI (on camera): “The criticism is that you know, this feels like the surveillance that Germany conducted 80 years ago. How do you respond to that?”
BALLON: “There is no surveillance.”
ALFONSI (voice-over): “Josephine Ballon is a CEO of HateAid, a Berlin-based human rights organization that supports victims of online violence.”
ALFONSI (on camera): “In the United States a lot of people look at this and say, ‘This is restricting free speech. It’s a threat to democracy.’”
BALLON: “Free speech needs boundaries. And in the case of Germany, these boundaries are part of our constitution. Without boundaries a very small group of people can rely on endless freedom to say anything that they want, while everyone else is scared and intimidated.”
ALFONSI: “And your fear is that if people are freely attacked online that they’ll withdraw from the discussion?”
BALLON: “This is not only a fear. It’s already taking place, already half of the Internet users in Germany are afraid to express their political opinion, and they rarely participate in public debates online anymore. Half of the Internet users.”