Plenary Session: Digital Services Act and fundamental rights issues posed

Digital Services Act and fundamental rights issues posed (A9-0172/2020 - Kris Peeters)

With regard to this report, I abstained in the vote because it lists a range of positive elements, but also presents an ambiguous element that must be improved.

We highlight the relevance attributed to the profusion of hate speech and disinformation in digital services, with online platforms being used to increase polarization phenomena in order to be used politically; to the business models generated by the evolution of these platforms based on the collection and analysis of user data, which can lead to serious scenarios, of which the Cambridge Analytica scandal, where personal data has been manipulated in order to exercise political influence over these people, is but an example; and also to the undesirable conjuncture of self-regulation in this type of markets, which prevents full respect for the fundamental rights of users and prevents verification of the imperatives of transparency, accountability and inspection of the activity of these operators.

With regard to the aforementioned gap, it should be noted that Community legislation prevents the imposition of a general obligation to control content, and the report indicates this possibility by referring to the use of automated tools that research and immediately remove elements previously flagged as illegal. We therefore believe that this ambiguity should be clarified.

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