The last round of negotiations lasted 16 hours. The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, spoke of a historic agreement. “Our new rules will protect users online, guarantee freedom of expression and open up new opportunities for businesses.” This is a strong signal for people, companies and countries around the world.
Among other things, platforms should be required to disclose the most important parameters of their recommendation algorithms. On many platforms, they decide which messages, videos or products are shown to users. There are always criticisms of mostly secret recommendation algorithms. In addition, there should be restrictions on personalized advertising with DSA, for example in the case of minors and particularly sensitive data such as policy settings.
Illegal offline must also mean illegal online
Among other things, the DSA must ensure that illegal content such as hate speech is removed from the Internet more quickly, harmful disinformation and war propaganda are shared less and less and fewer counterfeit products are sold on online marketplaces. The basic principle is: What is illegal offline must also be illegal online. Digital service providers should benefit from legal certainty and uniform rules across the EU. Large platforms with at least 45 million users need to follow significantly more rules than smaller ones.
Reuters/Geert Vanden Wijngaert European Commission President Von der Leyen described the agreement as a strong signal to people, companies and countries around the world.
Saturday’s deal has to be confirmed again by the European Parliament and EU states. This is considered a formality. The DSA could then go into effect next year. ÖVP MEP Barbara Thaler was happy with the “Internet spring cleaning” overnight. “Internet commerce is becoming fairer and cleaner,” the domestic market spokeswoman said in a statement to the APA. The new law benefits companies and customers. “Illegal content must no longer take place.” The DSA is a milestone for the digital single market in Europe.
However, German pirate deputy Patrick Breyer was disappointed with the outcome. “The new set of rules doesn’t deserve the term ‘digital basic law’ as a whole, because the disappointing agreement often fails to protect our fundamental rights on the Internet,” Breyer said. Martin Schirdewan of the German left, on the other hand, emphasized: “Through far-reaching transparency obligations, the DSA opens the black box of online platform algorithms.” going on the offensive against the supremacy of the big tech companies.”
The DSA is part of a large digital package proposed by the EU Commission in December 2020. The second part is the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which was agreed at the end of March. The DMA is primarily intended to restrict the market power of tech giants like Google and Facebook with stricter rules.
Hate-on-the-Net Act already passed in Austria
With the Hate on the Net Act, a regulation was passed in Austria at the end of 2020 to combat hate crimes on the internet. Austria is already holding Google, Facebook and company responsible for the package, Justice Minister Alma Zadic said during EU-level talks in February.