Is There a Threat to Big Tech Over Censorship of Political Content That Could Force a retreat
We have seen some lesser powers already ban Twit and FB. It seems some great powers are ready to take action.
Big Tech rests comfortably under the umbrella of legal immunity afforded to it by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act which has been interpreted to insulate them from nearly all legal claims arising out of their exercise of editorial discretion in moderating user content. The lawsuit between Parler and Amazon Web Services shows that the standard contract provisions obligate the user of Amazon’s hosting services to moderate their customers’ content to standards dictated by Amazon, with the remedy for violation of this provision being the termination of the hosting contract.
But the Guardian reports today that foreign government officials — in countries that don’t afford Section 230 immunity to Big Tech in their national laws — are not reacting in a positive way to the seemingly coordinated effort by Big Tech to deplatform Pres. Trump and many outlets of conservative commentary that use social media to publicize opposing political views.
Polish government officials have denounced the deactivation of Donald Trump’s social media accounts, and said a draft law being readied in Poland will make it illegal for tech companies to take similar actions there.
“Algorithms or the owners of corporate giants should not decide which views are right and which are not,” wrote the prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, on Facebook earlier this week, without directly mentioning Trump. “There can be no consent to censorship.”
There are two other newsworthy events on this topic outside the United States that suggest Big Tech might be wandering into dangerous territory by moderating political speech.
Fortune reported on Monday that leaders in Germany and France denounced the decision by Twitter and other social media companies to shutdown Pres. Trump’s access to their platforms.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel objected to the decisions, saying on Monday that lawmakers should set the rules governing free speech and not private tech companies.
“The chancellor sees the complete closing down of the account of an elected president as problematic,”…. Rights like the freedom of speech “can be interfered with, but by law and within the framework defined by the legislature — not according to a corporate decision.”
The German leader’s stance was echoed by French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who said that the state and not “the digital oligarchy” is responsible for regulations, calling big tech “one of the threats” to democracy.
That reflects a quite different point of view on the actions of Twitter, Facebook, and others from politicians who would never be considered as sympathetic to the political views of Pres. Trump.
The other episode this week involved a decision by the authoritarian government in Uganda to shut down all social media in the country ahead of elections set for today.