News
Digital Services Act is poorly formulated - Internet Society
December 2020 by Konstantinos Komaitis, Senior Director of Policy Strategy and Development at the Internet Society
With the European Commission, yesterday unveiling legislation that it would give regulators sweeping new powers to take on US tech giants, Konstantinos Komaitis, Senior Director of Policy Strategy and Development at the Internet Society, warns that governments are at risk of breaking the Internet if their approach to tackling online hate speech is poorly formulated.
“Policymakers need to tread carefully, or they risk damaging the infrastructure of the Internet and disrupting its evolution. For example, if upcoming legislation proposes making Internet intermediaries act as “trusted flaggers” of content, this would move them away from their core activity, expose them to litigation, damage competition, and disrupt the free and efficient flow of data around the globe.
“Similarly, any attempt to mandate “upload filters” risks undermining innovation - one of the key goals for Europe in the forthcoming years. Likewise undermining encryption could create significant security holes in the infrastructure and leave European users and services exposed to attacks and surveillance”, adds Komaitis.
