NEW YORK—Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is the 1996 measure known as the “First Amendment of the Internet,” but earlier this week Donald Trump called for the law to be repealed “immediately.” His Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, also supports repeal of Section 230, and Congress is now considering several bills to cut back the online free speech protections contained in the law.
Several of those bills have both Democratic and Republican support. But most take different approaches to how much the Section 230 protections should be rolled back, and the best way to do so.
Now, an academic report by New York University's Stern’s Center for Business and Human Rights has outlined a new, three-pronged approach to Section 230 that defends the 24-year-old law that is often described as the “26 words that created the internet,” but also suggests how the law could be modified to “provide leverage” over online platforms, forcing them to “accept a range of new responsibilities related to policing content.”
Under Section 230, a platform such as Facebook (which was still a decade away from existence when the law was passed) is protected from legal liability when it comes to content posted by users. That provision prevents a platform from undertaking the largely impossible task of monitoring every piece of content—allowing for a free flow of viewpoints and ideas.
Under the suggestions in the NYU report, titled Regulating Social Media: The Fight Over Section 230 — and Beyond, platforms would lose that liability protection if they “reject these responsibilities” for making sure that the content on their sites is not illegal or otherwise unacceptable.
What type of content would that be? The report’s author, Paul Barrett, writes that new rules should “require platform companies to ensure that their algorithms do not skew toward extreme and unreliable material to boost user engagement.”
Platforms would also be required to “disclose data on what content is being promoted and to whom, on the process and policies of content moderation, and on advertising practices.”
The second provision appears aimed at the micro-targeting capabilities of Facebook and some other social media platforms.
Platforms would also be required to “devote a small percentage of their annual revenue to a fund supporting the struggling field of accountability journalism,” to make up for the destructive economic impact that social media has exerted on traditional news outlets.
But the report also advocates keeping Section 230 in place—opposing the calls to repeal the law from both Trump and Biden. Finally, the report says that the government should create a new “Digital Regulatory Agency” that would oversee online platforms to make sure they live up to their “responsibilities” under Section 230.
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