EU Commission has today proposed a series of measures to tackle disinformation online. These include a Code of Practice on Disinformation that should be released by July 2018 “ensuring transparency about sponsored content, in particular political advertising, as well as restricting targeting options for political advertising and reducing revenues for purveyors of disinformation; providing greater clarity about the functioning of algorithms and enabling third-party verification; making it easier for users to discover and access different news sources representing alternative viewpoints; introducing measures to identify and close fake accounts and to tackle the issue of automatic bots; and enabling fact-checkers, researchers and public authorities to continuously monitor online disinformation;
The other measures consist in creating an independent European network of fact-checkers; building a secure European online platform on disinformation to support the network of fact-checkers and relevant academic researchers with cross-border data collection and analysis, as well as access to EU-wide data; enhancing media literacy to help Europeans to identify online disinformation and approach online content with a critical eye; supporting Member States in ensuring the resilience of elections against increasingly complex cyber threats, including online disinformation and cyber-attacks; promoting voluntary online identification systems to improve the traceability and identification of suppliers of information and promote more trust and reliability in online interactions and in information and its sources; calling on Member States to scale up their support of quality journalism to ensure a pluralistic, diverse and sustainable media environment.
Now, « We are calling on all actors, in particular platforms and social networks who have a clear responsibility, to act on the basis of an action plan aiming at a common European approach so that citizens are empowered and effectively protected against disinformation, reported Commissioner Mariya Gabriel, Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society. We will closely monitor the progress made and may propose further actions by December, including measures of regulatory nature, should the results prove unsatisfactory. »
As next steps the Commission will shortly convene a multi-stakeholder forum to provide a framework for efficient cooperation among relevant stakeholders, including online platforms, the advertising industry and major advertisers, and to secure a commitment to coordinate and scale up efforts to tackle disinformation. The forum’s first output should be an EU–wide Code of Practice on Disinformation to be published by July 2018, with a view to having a measurable impact by October 2018. By December 2018, the Commission will report on the progress made. The report will also examine the need for further action to ensure the continuous monitoring and evaluation of the outlined actions.