The European Union approves the law that will regulate digital platforms

Almost two years after the European Commission (EC) put it on the table, this mammoth legislative project establishes a series of new rules for technology companies will affect social networks, messaging services and app stores. These regulations range from eliminating illegal content published in those spaces to limiting the extraction of user data for personalized advertising, through new obligations and transparency mechanisms on algorithms.

The text approved by the European Parliament and announced by its new president, Roberta Metsola, imposes Significant restrictions on digital advertising that feeds off private data collection of citizens and prohibits the specific use of sensitive data such as racial or ethnic origin, sexual orientation or religious beliefs and data of minors. Thus, it supposes a major setback to the economic model of mass surveillance that covers the duopoly formed by Google and Facebook. In 2020, Google billed 147,000 million dollars in advertising, which represents up to 80% of its income. In the case of Facebook, that percentage grows to 85%, accumulating 84.2 billion.

adapt to the times

In recent years, the EU has been overtaken by the meteoric rise of digital platforms that have transformed the economy and society. The consolidation of power by companies like Google, Amazon or Facebook has often gone hand in hand with abusive practices. Brussels has tried to contain them by investigating case by case and applying sanctions based on the Directive on Electronic Commerce, approved in 2000 and still in force. The DSA will allow the law to adapt to the times and go beyond individual cases to regulate digital platforms.

With this directive, The EU seeks to reaffirm its global leadership in data protection and streamline the control of large technology companies, pillars that can mark the internet of the next decade. Brussels has reiterated that its will is to create a more secure and private digital space for users. The obligations of the DSA will affect all digital companies, but will have a special impact on the activity of industry giants. The larger the company, the greater the requirements to be met. Although they are foreigners, they must all have legal representatives in Europe.

More transparency

The text approved this Thursday establishes that these companies must be much more transparent. Thus, among other things, they must inform the authorities about what measures they take to identify and eliminate the publication of illegal content, about who sponsors the ads that users see and about the operation of their recommendation algorithms, which must be periodically subjected to external audits. The academic world must have access to these data in order to study the social impact of these technologies.

The DSA will have visible benefits for users. The rule will force the platforms to inform them of the removal of content and give them instruments so they can challenge that decision. They must also be more transparent with the conditions of use and privacy policies, which now appear in long legal texts that are difficult to understand.

In addition, the package of the new European regulation includes the Digital Markets Standard (DMA), aimed at large companies and that will prohibit preventing users from uninstalling applications installed by default. In case of non-compliance, the DMA establishes sanctions of up to 10% of the world turnover of these companies.