A proposal being considered by California legislators would require social media companies to make public their policies for removing problem content and give detailed accounts of how and when they remove it.
Assemblyman Jesse Gabriel, D-Woodland Hills, at podium, outlines his proposed measure to require social media companies make public their policies for removing problem content and give detailed accounts of how and when they remove it during a news conference in Sacramento, Calif., on Tuesday June 21, 2022. The bipartisan measure stalled last year over free speech concerns.
“We think we've found a way to thread that needle,” Gabriel said during a news conference promoting what he said is first-of-its-kind legislation. “We’re not telling you what to do — but tell policymakers and tell the public what you are doing.” The proposal sailed through the state Assembly more than a year ago on a 64-1 vote, then ground to a halt in the Senate Judiciary Committee. It faces a crucial hearing in that committee next week, days before its deadline for moving bills to the full Senate.
And the enforcement allowed under the bill is “onerous and problematic,” subjecting companies to possible civil penalties and investigation over the filing of a report. The potential for lawsuits would be counterproductive, the groups said, and could “suppress ongoing efforts to protect users from harmful content online.”
“They know what their algorithms do. We don't know,” Pan added. “We need to know what's going on inside that black box. We need to know what those billions of dollars they've invested in researching how we think actually drives the decisions they make."