The European Commission has called on X, TikTok, Facebook and other online platforms to reduce election risks and crack down on voter disinformation as part of new guidelines adopted on Tuesday.
advertisementThe guidelines target online platforms with more than 45 million active users in the EU, and are therefore designated as “very large online platforms and search engines” in the EU's forerunner. digital services law (DSA) – sets out potential measures to address election-related risks, harmful AI content, and misleading political advertising.
It also includes specific guidelines for June's critical pan-EU elections, amid concerns about increased malicious interference and a flood of misinformation online.
Although the guidelines are not legally binding, the European Commission could initiate formal proceedings against any platform that deviates from the DSA's provisions regarding elections and democratic processes. This could subject executives to fines of up to 6% of global revenue for non-compliant platforms and search engines.
The move is part of a concerted effort by the city of Brussels to crack down on self-regulatory trends in an industry that has often been criticized as complacent and inadequate, and to force big tech companies to do more to uphold democratic values. .
A senior EU official said the guidelines were in response to “threats” to the integrity of elections in the region, particularly from the rapid introduction of generative AI and the proliferation of misleading deepfake content that “sows division” in European societies. He said there is.
Last October, a deepfake recording of a candidate claiming that votes in Slovakia's elections were fraudulent went viral, posing a clear threat to the integrity of the democratic process.
Under the new framework, the platform will urgently alert to such high-risk situations under new incident response mechanisms and work with European and national authorities, independent experts and civil society organizations to identify emerging threats. It is necessary to deal with this.
Another concern of the committee is the so-called recommender system. This is the use of machine learning to prioritize divisive, harmful, or misleading content that has the potential to go viral. The guidelines call on platforms to design systems that give users “meaningful choice and control over their feeds.”
Safety measures for June elections
The adoption of these guidelines has been tactically preceded by the European Parliament elections. Consultation period You were invited to collaborate with the platform and provide feedback on the draft.
Some companies say they are already rising to the challenge of putting election protections in place ahead of the June vote. Google, meta and TikTok have set up so-called election centers to combat misinformation surrounding voting.
The European Commission said it would carry out stress tests of the rules on “relevant platforms” at the end of April, but it could not confirm which platforms would be required to carry out the tests.
With 370 million voters in 27 member states heading to the polls in June, the city of Brussels is worried that the need for content moderators fluent in the region's 24 official languages will put the platform's resources under strain. I am concerned that this may not be the case.
For example, Latest transparency report Among our global team of 2,294 people, we only have one content moderator who is fluent in Bulgarian, Croatian, Dutch, Portuguese, Latvian, and Polish. The company lacks human content moderators for the EU's 17 official languages, including Greek, Hungarian, Romanian and Swedish.
The complexity of the language means European elections are “particularly vulnerable”, the official said.
This move will also take place during biggest election year More than 2 billion voters are expected to head to the polls in what will be a historic moment in the world.
The official said that while complying with the DSA is “costly,” the cost of enforcing similar rules outside the EU is “marginal,” so platforms are encouraged to roll out similar safeguards around the world. He admitted that he could consider it.
