On Tuesday 6 July, MEPs approved (537 votes in favour, 133 against and 24 abstentions) the temporary derogation on the use of technology for the processing of personal data for the purpose of combating child sexual abuse online (see EUROPE 12710/3).
The provisional Regulation will apply for a period of three years. Full legislation is expected to be presented by the European Commission in the autumn.
“The agreement reached by the European Parliament and the EU Council is a compromise between detecting abuses on the one hand and protecting communication and exchanges on the Internet on the other. It may not be perfect, but it is a good transition before the next step”, said Birgit Sippel (S&D, Germany), rapporteur for the European Parliament, on Monday 5 July, during a plenary debate.
In particular, the new Regulation proposes that human supervision should be required for any processing of personal data, as well as confirmation of the same before reporting to the competent authorities.
Internet service providers - whose responsibility was often mentioned by MEPs during the debate - will have to provide guarantees that the technologies used to detect child pornography and report child sexual abuse are as non-intrusive as possible to privacy.
“All service providers must live up to expectations so that no one uses the networks to disseminate this type of content”, said the European Commission representative, recalling that nearly four million images and videos had been reported in the EU in 2020.
“It was a question of finding a balance and I think this temporary regulation achieves the objectives, pending the adoption of a definitive initiative”, said Juan Fernando López Aguilar (S&D, Spain).
See the report: https://bit.ly/2UrHuXc (Original version in French by Thomas Mangin)