European Parliament adopts Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act

On July 5, 2022, the EU Parliament voted in favor of the long-awaited Digital Markets Act (DMA) and Digital Services Act (DSA) following trilogue talks and agreements held between Parliament, Council, and European Commission earlier this year.

While the DSA amending the e-Commerce directive strictly prohibits specific forms of targeted advertising and misleading practices, the DMA can be viewed as the Competition law component that sets out stricter obligations for large online platforms within the Commission’s Digital Services Package.

Upon entry into force, advertisements targeting children, advertisements based on sensitive data, and dark patterns will no longer be permitted. Further, online platforms need to provide its users with the option and choice to not receive recommendations based on profiling. What the DSA also seeks to do, is to strengthen platform’s accountability and transparency. This means  that these platforms have to provide authorities and vetted researchers with access to information on the content moderation rules the respective platform uses as well as information on the algorithms used by recommender systems.

The spread of illegal content, such as hate speech, is also being addressed by these legislations obliging large platforms to respond quickly with due regard to other fundamental rights implicated.

Online platforms and other service providers not respecting the new obligations, may be fined with 10% of their annual total turnover in case of violations of the DMA, and 6% for violations of the DSA.