Content moderation à la EU

In case you missed it, listen to Kieran Lindsay on our Podcast Double Take with Ruairi Harrison, who is an expert in the European Union’s out-of-court dispute resolution process under its Digital Services Act. Ruairi runs his own digital policy consultancy and previously worked with the Internet Commission, a non-profit that works to advance trust in digital services.

Kieran and Ruairi look at how Europe deals with content moderation – specifically when a digital platform makes a decision about content that someone wants to dispute. They examine the operation of Article 21 of the Digital Services Act, which allows for the creation of external dispute resolution bodies, which can hear disputes between individuals and the digital platforms regarding content-moderation decisions made by those platforms. 

It’s a contentious issue, given the EU’s strong focus on maintaining fundamental rights and the subjective nature of determining content disputes. On top of that, decisions by these external bodies are non-binding. 

Kieran ultimately asks, what can Australia learn from the EU model?

In the realm of research, the CMT team is working on the second stage of the generative AI and journalism research project with a report coming later this year. We began this journey in 2023, when we conducted a widescale investigation of the attitudes towards generative AI in news production and steps being undertaken by Australian newsrooms to prepare for its possible deployment. You can take a look at our initial GenAI and Journalism report here in preparation for the next.