“Platforms must not retreat from facts. If they do so, they create a vacuum where disinformation thrives unchecked and the harm to democracy is deep”, declared Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Michael O’Flaherty on Thursday, 9 January.
Reacting to Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement that he was ending the fact-checking service on Meta (Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp)—which was preceded by that decreed by Elon Musk for the social network X—the commissioner sees this as an illustration of a “fundamental tension” between the preservation of freedom of expression and the “spread of harmful speech” amplified by algorithms.
Michael O’Flaherty does not consider combating this [type of] speech, which is often “hateful” and “violent,” as censorship but as a commitment to protecting human rights.
He refers to European Court of Human Rights case law, which makes respect for human dignity the “foundation of a democratic, pluralistic society”, and calls on European states to “redouble their efforts and demonstrate principled leadership”.
The commissioner concludes that it is a matter of striking “a balance that upholds freedom of expression within its well-established limitations” so as to protect human rights—calling for cooperation among state actors, platforms, and civil society.
Link to the statement: https://aeur.eu/f/ezv (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)