During the plenary session of the European Parliament in Brussels (08-11 February 2021), MEPs debate the Democratic Scrutiny of Social Media and the Protection of Fundamental Rights. Opening statements by Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs and by Vĕra JOUROVÁ, Vice-President of the European Commission.

Democratic Scrutiny of Social Media and the Protection of Fundamental Rights: Opening statements by Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs and by Vĕra JOUROVÁ, Vice-President of the European Commission

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SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, Honourable members in the recent weeks have shown that even the most robust democratic structures are not safe from damage. What happened on the other side of the Atlantic must inform our debate in Europe as our democratic societies are not immune to the harmful influence of hate speech, disinformation, fake news and incitement to violence. These events have also shed light on the increased importance of online platforms and social media companies in shaping the public debate.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs,They have highlighted the growing interconnection that exists between digital transformation and democracy, which is one of the priorities of the Portuguese presidency. It is unquestionable that social media companies have the status of public squares, which means they should have responsibilities when it comes to enhancing citizens' participation and ensuring freedom of expression.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, Nevertheless, freedom of expression is not absolute. It should be balanced with the goal of combating illegal hate speech, incitement to violence and radicalisation, both online and offline. What is illegal? What is illegal offline must be illegal online. Online platforms have repeatedly been criticised for the lack of transparency in the use of algorithms on content moderation and for targeting users on the basis of a vast amount of personal data generated from online activity. The digital space has also become a breeding ground for conspiracies and fake news.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, Disinformation spreads faster than any virus education, media and digital literacy are the best vaccines against that. We expect online platforms to play their part in this common fight, but it is up to the democratic institutions, our laws, our courts to set the rules of the game to define what is illegal and what is not, what must be removed and what should not be. Without democratic scrutiny and a level playing field there is a risk to users rights information flows and public participation.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, The protection of fundamental rights requires transparent and consistent rules for all of us. Social media outlets included the recently proposed European Democracy Action Plan. The Digital Services Act, the Digital Markets Act are important steps forward and will make the digital environment more transparent. And actors like social media companies more accountable. The council has already started the discussions on this important instruments.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, These initiatives must also be considered in conjunction with the upcoming Media and Audiovisual Action Plan, which will be the subject of the council conclusions that we intend to adopt during our presidency. In addition, we are expecting for the third quarter of the year a commission legislative proposal to ensure greater transparency in the area of sponsored content in a public context, complementing the Digital Services Act, the Council is ready to cooperate with this Parliament to ensure adoption sufficiently ahead of the 2020 for European elections.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, Moreover, the presidency will host the digital assembly in Lisbon in June, where the concepts of digital democracy and digital rights will be discussed. The presidency intends to consolidate the idea that Europe is a reference in the digital era, that our values and way of doing business are a competitive advantage. We want to place this idea at the heart of the European digital strategy for the next digital decade. The presidency will also hold a High-Level Conference on the Future of Journalism and its interconnection with artificial intelligence, with a special focus on the robotisation of news production.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, Madam Chair. Honourable Members. The current times have brought up sharp relief. The unavoidable reality that has happening online shapes what is happening online, shapes our lives, believes and choices. It deeply influences what we buy or who we vote for, who will listen to, and even our opinion on vaccines. In its recent conclusions, the council stressed the need to foster a well functioning digital public sphere, greater accountability and improved transparency in addressing disinformation. Countering discorage is crucial to preserve open political debate and effective participation of citizens.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs, We need to prevent social media to function as an echo chamber which suppresses different points of view. And we need to make sure our citizens are equipped to manage the flood of information they are exposed to every day. In times such as this, believing in unreliable information may be lethal. We welcome, therefore, the work on the rapid alert system and other monitoring instruments. We encourage support for media and digital literacy, media pluralism, media independence, and fact checking. Let me reassure you that the presidency is committed to working with the European Parliament and with the Commission and the European External Action Service on these crucial issues in order to promote and protect our fundamental rights and our democracy. Thank you for your attention.

SOUNDBITE (Original), V&#277;ra JOUROV&#193;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, Madam President, honourable members, thank you for organising this debate. I know we don't have much time, so I will try to brief rather than exhaustive in my introductory remarks. Social media has transformed the way we communicate with each other, debate on political issues or do campaigning. There are a lot of new opportunities, but also a lot of problems with the recent attack on the Capitol. We got a tangible yet tragic proof that many people have simply lost trust in democratic institutions. Going online only exacerbated many of the existing problems and cleavages in our societies.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, The U.S. events are the moment of reckoning also because they reminded us of the power of Twitter, Facebook and other technological corporations also use the fact that they can permanently remove an account of a sitting president based on vague criteria and unclear oversight is really worrying. Even though I believe President Trump's irresponsible incitement to violence deserved action. It is high time to rein in the unchecked power of the digital corporations. Whatever we do, we must uphold the principle of freedom of speech. I do not want to create a ministry of or arbiter of truth. This is the main principle.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, So what can we do? First, we need tougher regulation, more enforceable obligations and increased the responsibility of digital players. We have recently proposed the Digital Services Act that will increase accountability of online platforms and clarify the rules for taking down illegal content, including hate speech and incitement to violence. This is a groundbreaking proposal and will also give us the tools for stronger monitoring and enforcement of the obligations of online platforms. We need these rules urgently and we are ready to work together with you and the member states to quickly adopt this law.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, What can we do already now, while waiting for the Digital Services Act to become law? We can equip ourselves already now with better tools to fight disinformation and harmful content. The European Democracy Action Plan is our map of what we should do next. In this respect, we can already now strike a new pact against disinformation with better accountability of algorithms and no arbitrary decisions by big online platforms. We can and should have more transparency of their policies and access to relevant data. In the Digital Services Act, we moved away from assessing harmful content and focus on manipulative techniques of online distribution.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, We need to go more in detail on this debate promotion and paid likes reactions from fake accounts. Bots can be particularly dangerous for democracy, notably during elections. This is why I will propose new regulation on online political advertising. And freedom of speech is not the same as freedom of speech. Regulation alone will not, and in my view should not address all the details of digital life. When I talked to Mark Zuckerberg and other CEOs of the big tech, we discussed solutions that go beyond regulation because we must not sacrifice freedom of expression, which requires open space, be it online or offline. They cannot judge and evaluate every piece of content posted on them.

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, This is why we need to reshape the thinking of the companies and tech workers. Architects follow not only law but also ethical codes to ensure that the buildings they design are safe for the people. Coders and I.T. experts should have a similar approach when designing their algorithms, something I rarely hear from the tech executives. And asset, we cannot focus on social media platforms alone. We need to make our education fit for digital reality. We all have to become more digitally literate, understand the basics of what is happening online and why we are seeing certain content.[43.1]

SOUNDBITE (Original), Vĕra JOUROV&Aacute;, Vice-President of the EC in charge of Values and Transparency, This will allow us to navigate safely online as a person coming, as many of you from an ex totalitarian country, in my case, the communist Czechoslovakia. I have tasted life without democracy and freedom of speech. I believe we need to bring order to the digital expression of democracy and to end digital Wild West. What is illegal offline must be illegal online, but we also have to work on restoring trust of the citizens. FACT's belong to everyone. Opinions belong to an individual, and this distinction has been damaged and can only be repaired if there is trust in science, in authorities, in society. We all have a very important role to play in this as well. Thank you for your attention.

Democratic Scrutiny of Social Media and the Protection of Fundamental Rights: Opening statements by Ana Paula ZACARIAS, Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs and by Vĕra JOUROVÁ, Vice-President of the European Commission

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