According to campaign organizer Ross Scott, authentic signatures are still needed, as a counter-effort involving signature forgery could cause serious issues.
Just two weeks ago, the Stop Killing Games initiative seemed to be in trouble. According to Ross Scott, founder of the campaign, the deadlines for the EU and UK petitions were fast approaching, yet both were still far from the required number of signatures to advance. However, the situation changed dramatically in a short time. The UK petition was the first to reach its goal of 100,000 signatures, triggering a mandatory parliamentary debate. Back in May, when it surpassed 10,000 signatures, the UK government issued a response claiming that existing legislation was adequate and rejected the request for stricter regulations. That response came from the Department for Culture, Media, and Sport and does not affect how Parliament will proceed.
Scott told PC Gamer he has no idea how the parliamentary debate will unfold, but he is much more optimistic about the European Citizens’ Initiative. That petition surpassed one million signatures yesterday, legally obligating the European Commission to review the issue and take action. The problem is that not all those signatures may be legitimate. Some were entered incorrectly and are thus disqualified, while others may be outright fake, as a possible spoofing campaign has emerged. Scott said he received screenshots from platforms like 4chan and Discord that show such activity. He repeated these concerns in the embedded video below and warned people not to do this. Forging signatures is a crime — this is a governmental procedure.
It’s unclear if anyone will be prosecuted for submitting fake signatures to the EU petition, but Scott noted that cooperation between Interpol and the FBI is not uncommon. Europe takes its democratic processes seriously, especially in cases involving botnets flooding systems with thousands of fake names. Scott admitted he has no clear idea where the actual signature count stands. He estimates there are at least 600,000 or maybe 700,000 valid entries, but a well-coordinated botnet could have heavily distorted the numbers. The forged signatures do not invalidate the campaign, as all legal ones are still counted — but there’s a risk that people see the goal as already met and don’t bother signing.
“I was really looking forward to hitting a safe margin and moving on from this. But now, I think I’ll have to keep pushing until July 31, because there is no safe margin anymore. I genuinely don’t know what’s real. So, to those who hate this campaign: you got me. This makes my life harder, and now I’m stuck even longer. I’ll be so happy when this campaign ends. You know how during WWII some Japanese soldiers were holed up on Pacific islands and didn’t get the memo that the war ended in 1945 — so they stayed for years thinking it was still going? That’s kind of where I’m at mentally right now.” – said Scott.
Scott has also heard about the Stop Killing Games cryptocurrency (which he believes is likely a scam) and urged his supporters not to harass PirateSoftware, aka Thor, a streamer who previously criticized the campaign. According to Scott, any damage done by those videos has already been neutralized. Regarding the UK petition (now sitting at 140,000 signatures), Scott believes most of them are valid. He’s more hopeful the EU petition will lead to real action, but is comforted by the fact that the UK effort can’t turn out any worse than it already has.
You can sign the EU petition here.
Source: PCGamer
