Under a revised code of conduct on online speech, the European Commission says that Big Tech signatories need to allow a network of “monitoring reporters” to regularly monitor hate speech notices.
On Jan. 20, the European Commission announced that updated hate speech guidelines will be folded into the Digital Services Act (DSA).
The DSA is an EU-wide regulation that regulates the obligations of digital services.
Part of this requires social media platforms to remove, and take other specified steps to deal with, what is deemed disinformation. The DSA fully came into force in 2024.
Under the revised code, companies that are signed up must allow a network of “monitoring reporters” that are nonprofit or public entities with expertise on illegal hate speech to regularly monitor how the signatories are reviewing hate speech notices.
They will have to review at least two-thirds of hate speech notices received from monitoring reporters within 24 hours.
The EU said that the updated code of conduct, a voluntary instrument, builds on a 2016 code on “countering illegal hate speech online.”
European Commission Spokesperson Thomas Regnier told The Epoch Times by email that Facebook, Instagram, and X are among the signatories of the new code of conduct. These platforms were also part of the previous code of conduct, initiated in 2016, he said.
It was also signed by Dailymotion, Jeuxvideo.com, LinkedIn, Microsoft-hosted consumer services, Snapchat, Rakuten Viber, TikTok, Twitch, and YouTube.
The EU also wants signatories to present “country-level data broken down by the internal classification of hate speech (such as race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity or sexual orientation).”
Some of the monitoring reporters include Amnesty International Italia, German organisation HateAid, and the French Ministry of the Interior’s dedicated portal to cybercrime, PHAROS.
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