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'No longer acceptable' for platforms to take key decisions alone, EU Commission says
It is "no longer acceptable" for social media giants to take key decisions on online content removals alone, following the high profile takedowns of US President Trump's accounts on Facebook and Twitter, the European Commission has said.
Trump's accounts have been suspended by the two platforms for inciting calls to violence ahead of the violent riots that hit Washington's Capitol Hill last week.
Speaking to lawmakers on Monday (11 January), Prabhat Agarwal, an official who heads up the eCommerce unit at the European Commission's DG Connect, noted how the EU executive's Digital Services Act attempts to realign the balance between effective content removal and preserving freedom of expression online.
"It is no longer acceptable in our view that platforms take some key decisions by themselves alone without any supervision, without any accountability, and without any sort of dialogue or transparency for the kind of decisions that they're taking," Agarwal said.
"Freedom of expression is really a key value in this," he told the European Parliament's internal market committee.
The comments came following concerns raised by some lawmakers in the European Parliament following the suspension of Trump's social media accounts. In doing so, platforms giants had demonstrated that they yield a disproportionate degree of power over the freedom of speech online.
"The fact that platforms like Twitter and Facebook decide who can speak freely is dangerous," Green MEP Kim van Sparrentak said.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Friday January 15 2021, @07:54PM (4 children)
Quasi-public restrictions are limited, but they are limited based on purpose. If you create a space where you invite people in for the purpose of operating a retail business, then you can kick people out that you don't want to do business with (though even that is subject to accessibility and protected class protections). But if the purpose of the space is for the public to interact and speak with each other, then that comes with an obligation to allow everyone to speak freely. Currently this legally only applies to real property, but I think extending the same principles to internet sites makes sense.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Saturday January 16 2021, @01:26AM (3 children)
But if the purpose of the space is for the public to interact and speak with each other, then that comes with an obligation to allow everyone to speak freely. Currently this legally only applies to real property, but I think extending the same principles to internet sites makes sense.
Sorry, no, I don't buy it. You'll have to provide proof if you want me to believe this wild-ass claim.
There is no way I will believe that someone can open a privately-owned space for the public to interact, and then be required to allow literal Nazis to speak freely.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Saturday January 16 2021, @06:28AM (2 children)
The circumstances are limited, but there are certain situations. See Marsh v. Alabama.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Saturday January 16 2021, @07:29PM (1 child)
Interesting, and thanks for actually responding to my challenge with a substantive reply.
However, at the very end of the Wikipedia article about this SCOTUS case, it says: 'Recently the case has been highlighted as a potential precedent to treat online communication media like Facebook as a public space to prevent it from censoring speech. However, in Manhattan Community Access Corp. v. Halleck the Supreme Court found that private companies only count as state actors for first amendment purposes if they exercise “powers traditionally exclusive to the state."'
So, it does look like using this case as precedent has already been attempted, but failed at the SCOTUS level. In the Marsh case, the company town was exercising normal state powers, like policing, maintaining infrastructure (the town roads and sidewalks and probably utilities too), etc. Facebook et al don't do any such thing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Community_Access_Corp._v._Halleck [wikipedia.org]
Interestingly, it was the Court's conservatives who wrote the majority opinion here. The Court is now ever more conservative thanks to Trump, so I wouldn't expect them to rule differently if they're traditional, constitutional conservatives (which they appear to be), because they typically are more in favor of private-property rights than liberals.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Sunday January 17 2021, @07:28PM
Yeah, true. It's not likely that it will happen in the courts. Although, that really shouldn't be the process to make changes anyway. The best approach would be to change the law to address it. That would probably take the form of some common carrier like standards and objective and fair guidelines for removing content and banning users. Enforcement could be accomplished by fines as well as revoking section 230 protections for repeated violations.