President Trump has complained that technology companies unfairly censor conservative views on their platforms.
Photo: Chris Kleponis/Bloomberg NewsThe Trump administration moved forward with plans to regulate content on social-media platforms Monday, formally asking federal regulators to start overseeing how these platforms treat user-generated content.
In a petition to the Federal Communications Commission, the Commerce Department called for an FCC rule-making to reinterpret key elements of Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act. That provision has given online companies broad immunity from legal liability for their users' actions, and wide latitude to police content on their sites.
“Unfortunately, large online platforms appear to engage in selective censorship that is harming our national discourse,” the petition says. “The FCC should determine how Section 230 can best serve its goals of promoting internet diversity and a free flow of ideas, as well as holding dominant platforms accountable for their editorial decisions, in new market conditions and technologies that have emerged since the 1990s.”
The action follows complaints by President Trump and others who say left-leaning Silicon Valley technology companies unfairly censor conservative views on their digital platforms.
The internet industry has dismissed those claims, and is expected to resist attempts to reframe Section 230 as an intrusion on the free-speech rights of technology companies.
In a statement, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said the commission will carefully review the petition. But FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, said the panel “shouldn’t take this bait.”
“While social media can be frustrating, turning this agency into the President’s speech police is not the answer,” Ms Rosenworcel said in a statement. “If we honor the Constitution, we will reject this petition immediately.”
Still, the petition comes amid the run-up to the Nov. 3 election and is likely to lead to further scrutiny of political content on social-media platforms.
The Commerce Department request follows an executive order issued by Mr. Trump in May, when he proposed limits on Section 230 after Twitter Inc. said it would apply a fact-checking notice to tweets by the president with unsubstantiated claims about voter fraud.
Twitter described the executive order as “a reactionary and politicized approach to a landmark law,” and the measure already has been challenged in federal district court in Washington, D.C. by an online-rights group, the Center for Democracy and Technology, in a case that is ongoing.
Mr. Trump’s order seeks to make it easier for federal regulators to hold companies such as Twitter and Facebook Inc. accountable if they unfairly curb users’ speech by, for example, suspending their accounts or deleting their posts.
The order directed the Commerce Department to petition the FCC to set up a rule-making proceeding to clarify the scope of Section 230. A key focus of that proceeding would be to determine when platforms have failed to live up to their obligations to act in “good faith” under the law when they police content.
The rule—if it were adopted by the FCC—would be similar to a transparency rule already in place for internet service providers such as cable and wireless companies. That rule is aimed at promoting fairness in how the providers treat internet traffic from different websites.
In effect, the new rule would impose the same fairness principle for how social-media platforms treat their users’ comments, requiring the companies to live up to their public commitments. If companies failed to live up to their commitments, they could be subject to punishment by the Federal Trade Commission, a separate agency.
In a statement, the FTC said it is committed to robust enforcement of consumer protection and competition laws, including with respect to social-media platforms.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement that the petition is aimed at fostering a free flow of ideas on the internet.
“President Trump is committed to protecting the rights of all Americans to express their views and not face unjustified restrictions or selective censorship from a handful of powerful companies,” Mr. Ross said.
Write to John D. McKinnon at john.mckinnon@wsj.com
Copyright ©2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
"Media" - Google News
July 28, 2020 at 05:40AM
https://ift.tt/304NW6L
Trump Effort to Rein In Social Media Moves Forward - The Wall Street Journal
"Media" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2ybSA8a
https://ift.tt/2WhuDnP
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Trump Effort to Rein In Social Media Moves Forward - The Wall Street Journal"
Post a Comment