As expected, the European Union has confirmed that some of the world’s largest technology companies have confirmed their adherence to the new rule book to combat disinformation on the internet. Signatories include Meta, Twitter, Google, TikTok, Microsoft, Adobe, TikTok, and Twitch.
In total there are 34 companies that have joined this initiative, whose purpose is to establish stricter guidelines for the removal of harmful content from each platform. In this way, it seeks to exercise greater control over the proliferation of false news and propaganda publications, as well as the use of bots and false accounts.
By signing up to the European Union’s new anti-disinformation code of practice, companies make several commitments. Among them, cutting off economic income to users or pages that spread false news or misleading content; expand data verification in all the countries of the European bloc and in all the languages involved; and facilitating the recognition of political ads to make them more transparent to users, just to mention a few.
“This new code against disinformation comes at a time when Russia is using it as a weapon in its military aggression against Ukraine, but also when we see attacks on democracy in general. We now have very important commitments to reduce the impact of disinformation in line and much stronger tools to measure how they are implemented across the EU, in all countries and in all its languages. Users will also have better tools to flag disinformation and understand what they are seeing. The new code will also reduce incentives funds to spread disinformation and will allow researchers to access the data from the platforms more easily”.
Věra Jourová, Vice President of the European Commission
Big tech pledges to fight disinformation
That companies like Google and Meta commit to comply with the new European Union code against disinformation is not a minor detail. In the case of Facebook, it has been widely pointed out in recent years as one of the main global sources of disinformation; Some of the most controversial events have been those of Russian interference during the US elections that ended with Donald Trump elected as president, and the distribution of false news about the coronavirus pandemic and vaccines.
Google, meanwhile, has also come under fire multiple times on this issue. Not only by spreading malicious content through YouTube, but also through its search engine.
Twitter, for its part, has recently been at the center of the discussion for an alleged lack of freedom of expression; concept that has been poured by Elon Musk himself, who is trying to buy said social network. However, it has been the tycoon himself who has recently stated that the platform will respect the new European code against disinformation. “Anything that my companies can do that is beneficial for Europe, we want to do it,” the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX said at the time.
Thierry BretonEuropean Commissioner for the Internal Market and Services, has been forceful regarding the scope of the new rules to combat disinformation, which are part of the Digital Services Law. “Now we have very clear rules. Companies can do what they want outside of Europe, but in Europe they will have to comply with rules and obligations,” he said some time ago to The Wall Street Journal.
Those who do not comply with the code will be exposed to significant punishments, such as fines for up to 6% of your global turnover.