French Senate amendment would require removal of certain content within twenty-four hours

An adopted amendment is not yet applicable law

The French Senate adopted government amendment number 94 rectifié bis, dated October 27, expanding the possibilities for administrative removal of online content. The document covers certain direct incitement to violence, theft or property damage when it is likely to cause a serious disturbance to public order. This vote is a parliamentary step: by itself, it does not bring the new provisions into applicable law.

The mechanism sits within the law on confidence in the digital economy. Administrative authorities could send requests to online service publishers or hosting providers for content manifestly within scope. The explanatory statement provides for twenty-four hours and, if removal does not occur, the possibility of requesting blocking and delisting. The text therefore retains several possible recipients, from hosts to intermediaries enabling access to or discovery of a website.

Penalties are proposed for failure to remove content

The amendment restores an article penalizing a hosting provider’s failure to remove content manifestly covered by the measure within the prescribed period. It provides for six months’ imprisonment and a €150,000 fine. For a legal entity, the fine could reach 2% of worldwide revenue excluding tax in the preceding financial year. These are the provisions adopted in the Senate, whose outcome still depends on the remaining legislative process.

The precise scope matters as much as the deadline. The text refers to specified offenses and, for some targeted content, a serious-public-order-disturbance condition; it does not establish a general power to erase any unwelcome publication. Oversight arrangements, interaction with existing rules and possible later amendments must therefore be distinguished from political commentary about the vote. Describing the entire measure as a ban already in force would be premature.

Nostr distributes messages across multiple relays

The Nostr protocol relies on independent clients and relays rather than a single central server. Its documentation explains that users can publish messages to multiple relays and their readers retrieve them from those servers. Messages are signed with a cryptographic key, allowing clients to verify the author. A relay can choose its own retention and moderation policy, but it does not control other copies hosted elsewhere.

This architecture changes how a removal request can be executed without eliminating technical participants or legal obligations. Removing content from one relay does not demonstrate its deletion from every other relay; conversely, decentralization does not guarantee every relay or app will remain accessible. The debate therefore concerns identifying intermediaries, the territorial reach of measures and their practical effectiveness. Nothing in the amendment creates particular immunity for Nostr: analysis of the protocol and of the parliamentary text must remain separate.