Free Speech Historian Jacob Mchangama on Europe’s Digital Services Act
A very interesting L.A. Times op-ed from a couple of weeks ago; an excerpt:
In November, the European Union’s Digital Services Act took effect, with enforcement beginning for some businesses during the next year and for the rest in January 2024. The stated purpose of the law is to end the supposed “Wild West” of the internet and replace it with a rules-based digital order across the EU’s member states. The sweeping piece of legislation includes an obligation for platforms to evaluate and remove illegal content, such as “hate speech,” as fast as possible. It also mandates that the largest social networks assess and mitigate “systemic risks,” which may include the nebulous concept of “disinformation.”
This is in stark contrast to the U.S., where platforms enjoy broad immunity from responsibility for content created by users, and where the 1st Amendment protects against most government restrictions of speech….
Removing illegal content sounds innocent enough. It’s not. “Illegal content” is defined very differently across Europe. In France, protesters have been fined for depicting President Macron as Hitler, and il
Article from Reason.com
