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However, the act of publishing a website containing links to other sites is becoming an increasingly risky business.

A few months ago I pointed out that the act of publishing some a link to certain pieces of software or information could land you with a conviction and a stiff fine and now it's been brought to my attention that there is another category of links that could land you in very hot water.

Imagine this scenario...

You find a webpage you want to link to from your own site. It's a fairly innocuous page, perhaps containing something which is funny, topical or otherwise relevant.

It takes just a few minutes to add the link to your own page -- no problems.

A few weeks or months go by and suddenly there's a knock on the door.

The visitors identify themselves as being from the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA).

Readers Say (updated irregularly) Doppelganger sites... - Michael laws - written by lawyers... - Rob 1950's leadership!... - Dominic From Yesterday... Phone installation... - Richard Telecom... - Alan The winner is!... - John Telecom, Gattung... - Alan Satisfying people... - Dominic Have Your Say

They tell you that you're in big trouble because of your website and you ask "why?"

Well, it seems that (unknown to you) the page you linked to has been updated and now contains material covered by the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Act. (FVPCA)

The material on that page now breaches the Act and, because you've linked to it, you're also in breach of the Act.

Trying to explain that you didn't know the page had been changed by its owner carries no weight from a legal perspective -- ignorance is not a defence against this law.

What's even worse -- if the site to which you're linking carries even a single objectionable item anywhere on its pages -- you're breaking the law.

Maybe your own site is hosted offshore -- sorry, that won't save your bacon either. As far as the authorities are concerned, if it's administered from NZ then it's an NZ publication.

One would hope that the IAD would, in such cases, consider the transgression to be minor and simply move to warn you that you were in breach of the Act but it appears that they would be quite within the law (in fact it could be argued that they have an obligation) to charge you with an offence under the Act.

Okay, so you're probably thinking that it's very unlikely any of the sites you link to would suddenly replace an innocent page with porno right?

You're probably right -- but what if your site (or the site you're linking to) displays ad banners delivered by a third-party network and that network starts promoting publications that breach the FVPCA? Yes -- you're in hot water again!

It appears that linking to any site that contains objectionable material (whether you're aware of that material or not) constitutes promoting that material and puts you outside the law.

I wonder if all the NZ-based web directories and search engines thoroughly vet and review the sites they link to so as to ensure they're not falling foul of the FVPCA?

How many of us who link to interesting pages on other websites actually bother to thoroughly check every single page on those sites to ensure that there isn't an objectionable image, video, soundfile or other such material hidden away there somewhere?

But hang on, this is all hypothetical isn't it?

I'm afraid not. I know of at least one case where a Kiwi publisher has unwittingly run foul of the boys at the DIA simply by linking to material which (unknown to them) was likely to be considered "objectionable" under NZ law.

The reason I'm telling you this is that ignorance of the law is no defence -- yet the DIA seem to made no attempts to educate Kiwi online publishers as to their culpability in such cases.

Maybe it's time that this page was expanded to provide NZ's online publishers (including individuals posting personal websites) with more information on their rights, obligations and liabilities in respect to hypertext linking.

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