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Mitigating Risks Online: Disinformation v Truth?

AI image of a dark wet night with a tower at the end of a road
Date(s)
November 27, 2024
Location
LAN/0G/074
Time
14:00 - 15:30
Price
Free of charge

G-IPTech Lecture with Prof Martin Husovec

Mitigating Risks Online: Disinformation v Truth?

The Digital Services Act (DSA) creates a system of general risk management that is composed of two main obligations: risk assessment (Article 34), and risk mitigation (Article 35). The obligations are mandatory for very large online platforms and search engines (VLOPs/VLOSEs). The adoption of the risk-based approach to digital services make the law more future-proof. But inevitably it also makes the law very vague. This vagueness of the statutory language causes some to suggest that the European Commission will inevitably become the proverbial Ministry of Truth when tackling disinformation. This talk argues that upon closer reading of the DSA, and its constitutional context, the worries that the Commission inevitably becomes a Ministry of Truth are misplaced. Suppressing incorrect or misleading lawful information is not the goal of the DSA. That is not to say that the DSA cannot be abused. But the law is not pre-programmed to do so.

See for further background information about the lecture: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4689926

Prof Martin Husovec's Bio: https://husovec.eu/about-me

Event Organiser Details
Name Deaglan Coyle
Phone 02890973293
Email d.p.coyle@qub.ac.uk