The European Commission plans to launch a consultation on the Digital Services Act in the first quarter of 2020, after which it could present its proposals at the end of 2020. This is what emerged from a presentation attended by the Competition and Telecommunications Officers on Tuesday, November 5.
As a reminder, the President-elect of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has committed herself, in her political priorities, to present new legislation on digital services to "strengthen our rules on liability and security for digital platforms, services and products" (see EUROPE 12297/1).
In front of the diplomats, the European Commission reportedly reaffirmed that the 'electronic commerce' directive was no longer suitable to the current environment. It offers three reasons: the multiplication (and great underlying diversity) of digital services since the 2000s, the emerging legal fragmentation and the challenges of implementing legislation in all Member States as well as monitoring digital services. However, the Commission representatives remained relatively reserved, indicating that this was a general presentation, the beginning of the reflection, and that everything would depend on the future von der Leyen Commission.
According to rumours, it is already known that the Commission has the ambition to extend the scope of the e-commerce directive to cover collaborative economy actors such as BlablaCar or AirBnB (see EUROPE 12352/7). The new act would provide a set of minimum obligations, including those relating to the fight against cyberbullying and online hate speech. It would also clarify the rules on "notification and action" and strengthen cooperation with the competent authorities. At France's request, it could also provide for a special status for the large structuring platforms on the market (see EUROPE 12351/27). (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)