U.S. tech giants getting heat over misinformation online

The Yomiuri Shimbun

11:00 JST, May 21, 2021

To prevent digital discourse from descending into lawlessness, efforts need to be made to determine who should regulate what and how regulations should be implemented. In the United States, the debate has become complicated by the sharp political divide between liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans.

On the defensive

The three leaders of the world’s biggest tech giants, known for their liberal corporate cultures, all dressed in dark suits for their appearance together in an online hearing before a committee of the U.S. House of Representatives on March 25.

Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey and Sundar Pichai — the CEOs of Facebook, Twitter and Google, respectively — underwent about five hours of grilling by House lawmakers, who were looking at the ways speech is monitored on the internet.

“Our nation is drowning in disinformation driven by social media,” said one member from the majority Democratic Party. The party pressed the CEOs to unrelentingly remove posts containing false information, stressing that leaving up such content should not be allowed.

The spread of false information on the internet has been problematic for the Democrats. This was particularly so during the 2016 presidential election, which was said to have been influenced by the spread of disinformation, including allegations that Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton was involved in mass murder.

“All three of the companies that are here today run platforms that are hotbeds of misinformation and disinformation,” another Democratic member said in rebuke. “They must be held accountable for allowing disinformation and misinformation to spread.”

In contrast, Republican members reproached the three companies from a perspective of arguing for protecting freedom of speech, with one saying, “You have censored and taken down accounts of conservatives.”

Many conservative voters in the United States feel they are less free to express their opinions on such issues as racism and immigration. Twitter’s suspension of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s account while he was in office was condemned by Republican supporters.

The two sides traded barbs throughout the hearing, each with their own agenda and with no agreement on opinions.

The CEOs were caught in the middle and forced to go on the defensive. “Some of you will say we are doing too much and removing free speech rights,” Dorsey said. “Some of you will say we are not doing enough and end up causing more harm. Both points of view are reasonable and worth exploring.”

Debating rules

For the tech giants coming under political pressure from different directions, devising rules that satisfy many people is no simple task.

Moreover, if the national or a local government takes the lead in implementing restrictions like those seen in authoritarian countries, there is a danger that it will impinge on freedom of speech, the very basis of democracy.

In the United States, there is a move among state governments to create rules. In Texas in the heavily conservative south, debate has started on a bill that would limit the right of social media operators to “censor” political speech and other content.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, has openly shown hostility toward the tech giants, saying that efforts to silence conservative viewpoints on social media are wrong and that he will protect Texans from unjust censorship.

Common issue

The regulation of free expression on the internet is a common issue among democratic countries around the world.

In Britain, when Facebook announced in January last year that it would hire 1,000 workers to strengthen measures against harmful information, a local human rights group expressed concern.

The group urged that Facebook disclose information about the removal of posts, saying that social media companies must ensure not to threaten freedom of expression.

The European Union has been deliberating a bill that will oblige tech giants to remove illegal information, such as hate speech and copyright infringement, at the European Parliament with the aim of passing it within this year.

Regarding harmful information such as hoaxes and bias that cannot be clearly determined to be illegal, the bill will require tech companies to follow existing procedures.

The first steps for establishing a new order in the realm of speech have been taken.