A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants social media apps including Facebook, TikTok and Twitter to extend transparency by providing internal data to researchers.
Senators from each side of the aisle introduced the Platform Accountability and Transparency Act on Wednesday which might require tech corporations to submit data about ad libraries, content moderation and algorithms to an independent body.
The bill is geared toward addressing a “dangerous lack of transparency about how these platforms impact our youngsters, families, society, or national security,” in accordance with one in every of the co-sponsors of the laws, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.).
Social media corporations can be required to supply the info to researchers who’ve been approved by the National Science Foundation, which is an independent agency.
If the bill becomes law, it could be enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. Any company which fails to comply risks losing immunity from liability afforded to them by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
Section 230 protects apps from being sued for content posted by third-party members. Lately, there have been calls from public officials to repeal the law so as to rein in tech firms who’ve been criticized for his or her content moderation policies.
The bill is being co-sponsored by Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio); Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.).
Talk of regulating big tech has gained momentum lately as critics have accused corporations like Facebook, Google, Apple, and Amazon of gaining unfair competitive benefits because of their dominant positions within the marketplace.
Tech corporations, which have spent greater than $100 million in lobbying efforts over the past two years, breathed a sigh of relief this week when the Senate declined to think about bipartisan antitrust laws that posed a threat to their dominance.
Large tech firms comparable to Google and Apple intensely lobbied Capitol Hill to quash two bills that were approved by the House of Representatives geared toward curbing their monopolistic control over the digital marketplace.
There also appears to be a growing bipartisan appetite to either curb or ban TikTok, the favored Gen Z-dominated app, over concerns that its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, had access to Americans’ personal data that would pose a threat to national security.
Congress is anticipated to ban TikTok on government devices within the appropriations bill that have to be voted on by Friday.