Big Tech Companies in the US Have Been Told Not to Apply the Digital Services Act
The problems are preparing For the Digital Services Act (DSA), the law of European law governing platforms of large technologies. On August 21, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sent a scathing letter to a number of technology giants, including Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple. The subject of the letter: the European law on digital services cannot be applied if it endangers freedom of expression and, above all, the security of American citizens.
The opening of the letter – signed by the president of the FTC, Andrew Ferguson, explains an important reference to the first amendment of the American Constitution, namely freedom of expression: “Online platforms have become central to public debate, and online censorship omnipresent in recent years has passed to the American people. The previous administration has actively worked to encourage such censorship. »»
The Trump administration slit
The Trump administration intends to overthrow the course, and it is in this sense that the attack on the “foreign powers”, the European Union and in the United Kingdom, and in particular on the law on digital services and the online security law begins. The letter also indirectly refers RGPD, the European regulations on the protection of personal data, whose measures aim to “impose censorship and weaken encryption from start to finish” with the result of a weakening of the freedoms of the Americans, according to the letter.
End -to -end confidentiality and encryption: problems on the table
In the letter, the US Antitrust Authority specifically asked the 13 companies to point out “how they intend to comply with incorrect international regulatory requirements” (the deadline for planning a meeting was set for August 28) and recalled their “obligations to American consumers under section 5 of the federal law on the trade commission, which prohibits unjust security practices “which could distort the market or compromise security.
And it is precisely on the security front, and in particular on the adoption of an end -to -end encryption, that the FTC calls for large technological companies to order: “Companies that promise that their service is secure or encrypted, but fails to use encryption from start to finish, if necessary, can deceive consumers who expect this level of confidentiality.” In addition, “certain circumstances may require the use of end-to-end encryption, and the non-implementation of these measures may constitute an unfair practice”. The weakening of encryption or other security measures to comply with the laws or demands of a foreign government can therefore violate article 5 of the law of the Federal Commerce Commission, the document indicates.
What happens in case of disputes and interference
In a tweet on X, Ferguson categorically wrote that “if companies censor the Americans or weaken the security of privacy and communications at the request of a foreign power, I will not hesitate to apply the law”.
“In a global society like the one in which we live, the overlaps and the interference between the various legal systems are natural. Think of them, in the opposite direction, between the European legislation on privacy and the famous law on American cloud,” said Wired, Guido Scorza, member of the Italian Data Protection Authority. Scorza believes that in the event of significant differences, “it will be up to the United States government and the European Commission to identify corrective measures capable of guaranteeing sovereignty, including digital, of each country.”
This article originally appeared on Wired Italy and was translated from the Italian.
