Thierry Breton and the Digital Services Act

Erik Strand, 29.08.2023

On 25.08.23, EU’s “Digital Services Act” (DSA) took effect. While the DSA is highly problematic, EU Commissioner Thierry Breton held a speech praising the DSA.

A comment highly critical of the DSA and Breton’s statements on shutting down social media can be read here.

Thierry Breton has made it clear that he supports draconina measures against social media platforms that fail to crack down on problematic content fast enough. Politico quotes him threathening to shut down social media:

“”When there is hateful content, content that calls – for example – for revolt, that also calls for killing and burning of cars, they will be required to delete [the content] immediately,” Breton said in the interview on France Info, citing the Digital Services Act which will impose new requirements on large platforms from August 25.

“If they fail to do so, they will be immediately sanctioned. We have teams who can intervene immediately,” he said. “If they don’t act immediately, then yes, at that point we’ll be able not only to impose a fine but also to ban the operation [of the platforms] on our territory.””