New provisions in the Network Enforcement Act will give users a right to challenge social networks’ decisions on illegal content.
Background: Germany was one of the first countries to legislate against hate speech online. It passed the Network Enforcement Act (NetzDG) in June 2017, which requires social networks and platforms with more than 2 million users in the country to set up a complaints system and take down “obviously illegal content” within 24 hours. Companies have to appoint a representative in the country, and may face fine up to €50m from the second infringement onward. In February 2020, the Minister of Justice announced additional amendments to the act against hate crime, with obligations for social networks to report hate and threats to enforcement authorities.
More amendments on their way: On 1 April 2020, the Minister of Justice unveiled further changes to the NetzDG, due to the need to implement the revised European Audiovisual Media Services Directive. The Directive now includes obligations to protect against criminal content on video sharing platform services, also for smaller and subject-specific providers, for example platforms for the distribution of video games. The Minister took the opportunity to make further amendments to the NetzDG by strengthening user rights, making reporting channels more user-friendly, simplifying information disclosure procedures, and expanding the scope of reporting obligations. The proposal would give users the right to challenge decisions made by a platform on whether content is removed or retained. In their future reports, platforms will have to explain changes compared to the previous ones, and to what extent they provide independent research institutions with access to anonymised data for scientific purposes. This is to help understand which groups of people are systematically targeted with illegal content.
What next? The proposal will now have to be discussed and approved by both chambers of the German Parliament. The Minister expects the process to be completed by September 2020, which is the deadline for the implementation of the revised Audiovisual Media Services Directive.
