Remove from friends: why in the US and the EU they started talking about tightening control over social networks

U.S. Attorney General William Barr wondered if IT giants were responsible for the content their users publish. He expressed this point of view during an open meeting organized by the US Department of Justice and devoted to considering the further fate of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

The topic of discussion was the norm, exempting large online platforms such as Facebook and Google, from responsibility for the content distributed by their users content. According to the current provisions of the law, social networks cannot be considered as publishers or distributors of user information. This significantly relieves companies of liability for published information, with the exception of information that violates criminal law and intellectual property law. Such an exception was introduced at the time by the authorities to support the IT sector, but now the question is being raised about revising these rules.

• US Attorney General William Barr
• Reuters
• © Al Drago

“Technology companies are no longer outsiders, but titans. In view of the changes taking place in the technological sphere, legitimate questions were raised as to whether there is a need for the extensive immunity provided for in Article 230 - at least in its current form, ”said Barr.

William Barr also added that he doubts that the law on decency in communications should prevent US authorities from suing IT companies to protect the interests of American citizens.

Similar initiatives are being considered now in the Old World. On February 19, the German government approved a bill aimed at combating hate speech on social networks. If the bill is supported by parliament, the leadership of social online platforms will be required to report to the law enforcement agencies on publications containing hate speech. We are talking, in particular, about the threats of murder, rape or material damage, reports of the preparation of terrorist attacks and the like. At the same time, social networks must remove relevant content. Also, social networks will have to report cases of expressing approval for serious crimes and anti-Semitic statements.

Search with bias

According to experts, in the case of the introduction of such norms, monitoring of social networks will be carried out not by people, but by special software algorithms. As the doctor of legal sciences, professor of RGAIS Anton Sergo noted in an interview with RT, this is the only way to look for something in the content published by billions of users of social networks.

“Theoretically, there is such an opportunity. This can be automated monitoring of messages for the presence of certain words in them, which may indicate incitement to hatred. How much such checks will be objective is a question for the authors of these technologies. At the second stage, such content can already be manually checked by special employees, ”said the expert.

The situation with the criteria for verifying content is much more complicated, especially when it comes to video and audio formats, said Dmitry Abzalov, a political scientist and leading expert at the analytical department of the Center for Political Conjuncture.

• Mark Zuckerberg
• Reuters
• © Andreas Gebert

“Social networks are a broad concept, and the issue of verification is very subjective. It is difficult to find a real reason to ban a user. In order to verify the content, common standards are needed for what can be attributed to racism, for example, on all other issues, too, ”said the expert in a comment to RT.

Note that initiatives related to restrictions on social networks are now being considered at the pan-European level. The EU may impose restrictions against communication platforms that refuse to control content for false information and incitement to hatred. This was announced on February 17 by European Commissioner for Industry Thierry Breton following talks with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

“Social networks, in particular Facebook, are certainly responsible to European users, as well as to the face of our democracy. We talked a lot about the need to seriously take up work to ensure full control over the entire volume of their content, ”TASS quoted Breton as saying.

According to him, if the social networks operating in Europe do not begin to fight against abuses, the European Commission will be forced to take more stringent restrictive measures.

At the same time, Zuckerberg’s proposals regarding content regulation were rejected in Brussels. The Facebook leadership believes that not a national, but a global policy in the field of regulating online content should act. IT companies cannot be held responsible for user-posted materials, otherwise there will be a threat to freedom of speech.

Now social networks, on their own or with the help of partners, are moderating content to incite hatred or fake news. So, on February 12, 2020, it became known about the opening by Reuters of a special department that will verify the authenticity of popular publications on Facebook and Instagram. However, according to what criteria employees will determine fakes, it is not reported.

Facebook has been collaborating with external partners to factheck news since 2016. True, this content verification system, according to experts, is not objective, since the non-profit organization Poynter Institute for Media Studies, which exists on donations from large donors, is engaged in the selection of “fact checkers”.

Experts doubt the complete impartiality of Facebook partners.

“For example, the same Reuters has its own political position. In any case, we can talk about subjective assessments and opinions, ”said Dmitry Abzalov.

Censorship tool

As noted by Dmitry Abzalov, the introduction of penalties for the distribution of "fake" news can easily develop into normal political censorship.

“This is a dangerous tool. Who in the modern world can really determine the reliability of any news? Indeed, verification itself usually takes place not without a subjective bias. Now, there simply does not exist a single and objective definition of “hatred” and “fake”, which the legislators of different countries talk about, ”the expert said.

A similar point of view is shared by Anton Sergo.

“It can be assumed that measures that will be taken in different countries initially to combat intolerance and misinformation on social networks can quickly turn into an instrument of censorship and the fight against dissent,” the expert summed up.