Marathon session of the US Supreme Court on "censorship" laws
Page 2: The laws
The two laws are quite different, each comprising a grab bag of provisions. Florida's law (known as SB 7072) regulates significantly more than just traditional social networks. The definition of"social media platform" includes all"information services, systems, Internet search engines, or access software providers" available in Florida that generate more than 100 million US dollars in annual revenue or have at least 100 million monthly users worldwide. This therefore also includes the companies mentioned in the hearing, Uber, Etsy and Amazon Web Services (AWS).
They are prohibited from excluding political office holders, political candidates and media companies for longer than 14 days, even if they have violated the terms of use. This is a reaction by the Republicans in power in Florida to the exclusion of Donald Trump by Twitter, Spotify, Meta Platforms and others following Trump's attempted coup in early 2021.
No protection for Disney in Florida
However, the protection for media companies does not apply to journalists, but only to large media companies - and even there, not to companies that operate theme parks. This is a deliberate kick against Disney because this media company dared to criticize Florida's governor for banning the mention of homosexuality in school lessons.
In addition, there are restrictions on how the registered online providers must treat all users. Terms of use must be applied uniformly; changes would be permitted no more than once every 30 days. Interventions such as the blocking of postings, the provision of notices, the reduced distribution of postings or the blocking of comments are only permitted after explicit notification of the respective user in individual cases. In addition, users are entitled to exemption from any algorithms, review of blocking decisions and insight into the access figures for each individual own or third-party post.
If a post is from a large media company (except theme park operators), political office holder or candidate, or if a post deals with an office holder or candidate, shadow-banning and prioritization are not permitted at all - unless someone pays for the prioritization. If online providers violate the law, they face severe penalties, claims for damages and exclusion from public contracts.
Texas
Although Texas' law (known as HB 20) attempts to refer only to traditional social networks, it goes much further. Any discrimination against a user's expression is defined as censorship: "'Censor' means to block, ban, remove, deplatform, demonetize, de-boost, restrict, deny equal access or visibility to, or otherwise discriminate against expression."
All of this is prohibited because of content or based on residence in Texas or a certain part of the state. Even users who express themselves in a frowned upon manner outside the platform may not be discriminated against on the platform. Social networks must therefore also host people who, for example, publicly call for the overthrow of the democratic system or condone racial discrimination. Contractual waivers for such "protection" are invalid.
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There are few exceptions; for example, an operator may only intervene to protect children if it has been requested to do so by relevant institutions, but not of its own volition. Even the threat of violence may only be blocked in certain cases.
Similar to Florida, there is the threat of penalties and lawsuits from users. In contrast to Florida, however, the Texas law would have an effect beyond the state's borders, as not only residents and visitors to the conservative state are entitled to sue, but also companies from other states that do business in Texas. Social network operators also fear that they will not be able to simply withdraw from Texas, as this alone could potentially be punished as illegal censorship.
The cases before the US Supreme Court are Moody v Netchoice (Case No. 22-277 regarding Florida) and Netchoice v Paxton (Case No. 22-555 regarding Texas).
(ds)
