对于平台责任，通常认为美欧相近，通过避风港原则，支撑了平台的发展。但目前美欧似乎出现了平台责任强化的苗头。这是否意味着过去范式的终结？非常值得仔细观察。这篇Politico的报道相对较新，发表于10月8日，较好地综述了美欧在这方面新的变化，翻译出来供大家研究之用。
以下是新闻报道全文翻译：
Politico作者：阿什利·福德（Ashley Fold） 2018年10月8日
不断增长的法律风险可能迫使谷歌、Facebook和Twitter在管理其平台内容方面，发挥更积极的作用。
目前，大西洋两岸的决策者们正在威胁要废除曾经支撑网络巨头谷歌、Facebook和Twitter蓬勃发展的法律——这样的一个变化可能会迫使这些公司祭出重拳，监控他们数十亿用户在互联网上所看到的内容。
在华盛顿和布鲁塞尔，一系列可追溯到网络早期制定的长达20年的法律规定--允许互联网公司托管用户发布的内容，而无需承担法律责任。得益于这一豁免，美国的企业围绕Facebook帖子、Instagram照片和YouTube视频等内容建立了巨大的利润引擎，而无需对内容进行提前筛选。
但现在美国和欧盟立法和监管机构，出于对网络恶作剧、仇恨言论和其他在线不良行为日益增加的担忧，开始削弱互联网平台的“豁免”保护。今年4月，美国总统特朗普（Donald Trump）签署了一项法案，该法案规定如果平台明知其所托管的内容有“性交易”，则要求互联网公司承担责任。国会中的民主党和共和党人也都在谈论为鸦片类药物的非法销售制定一个类似的例外规则。
与此同时，在布鲁塞尔，欧盟委员会近日提出一项议案，要求像Facebook这样的网站应在监管机关警告后一小时内撤下恐怖主义的内容——比如伊斯兰国的视频——否则将面临尚未明确的处罚。此前，欧盟对版权和视听媒体法进行了修订，这些法律要求YouTube和亚马逊等平台更积极地监控违规行为，包括在线版权侵权和不恰当地广告投放。
不断增长的法律风险，将可能迫使谷歌、Facebook和Twitter在管理其平台内容方面，发挥更积极的作用——考虑到大量的推文、快照、博客帖子、广告和其他相关内容，这是一项艰巨的任务。仅谷歌旗下的YouTube每分钟就会发布400小时的用户上传视频，该公司去年还夸耀称，其所有用户观看视频的时间能达到每天10亿小时。
曾在20世纪90年代参与起草美国科技责任条款的参议员罗恩·维登（Ron Wyden）（D-Ore.）警告称，如果该行业的法律保护消失，我们所知的互联网将不复存在。
“如果网站、互联网服务提供商、短信服务、视频游戏公司和任何其他类型的平台对他们所促进或以某种方式启用的每一个字眼和行为承担责任，整个系统将会关闭”维登告诉POLITICO。没有美国法律，“互联网上的合作和沟通将停止”他说。
但科技行业曾经的黄金声誉已在一系列破坏性的爆料中受到了打击，其中包括俄罗斯操纵社交媒体和Facebook的剑桥分析数据丑闻。甚至像维登这样的科技盟友也承认，如果互联网巨头不能更好地清理他们的服务，那么他们有利的法律地位就会受到威胁。
他说：“你没有使用这把剑，将会有强大的利益集团说，'这是我们在国会努力拿走盾牌的机会'。”
修改支撑技术平台法律的努力仍处于早期阶段，仍有可能偏离轨道。但事实是，大西洋两岸官员均瞄准了这些条款—— 美国《通信规范法》（Communications Decency Act）第230条以及欧盟的《电子商务指令》（E-Commerce Directive）——表明在过去几年人们对大型科技公司的态度发生了很大转变。
爆炸性增长
在万维网诞生之初，当数以百万计的普通用户开始涌向互联网时，美国和欧洲的政策制定者认为，有必要保护年轻的网络公司使其免受可能导致破产的诉讼。第230条的历史可以追溯到1996年，而《电子商务指令》则是在2000年出台。
但从那时起，情况发生了戏剧性的变化。数字市场研究公司eMarketer的数据显示，互联网用户数量激增，到2018年，全球互联网用户数量预计达到36亿。像谷歌和Facebook这样的大公司——在美国法律生效时甚至还不存在——现在主导着以广告为驱动的在线经济。
左翼和右翼的政客们多年来都在称赞科技行业及其创新精神。但如今，许多人开始问为什么这些在社会和日常生活中发挥核心作用的公司不应该像广播公司或公用事业公司那样受到监管。前白宫战略家史蒂夫·班农（Steve Bannon）就是那些对Facebook和谷歌实行实用监管的呼吁者之一。
美国立法者今年开启了反性交易法案的努力，该法案获得了两党的广泛支持，因为国会压倒了科技公司对任何修改豁免条款的抵制。
大约在同一时间，欧盟对恐怖主义、版权和媒体的规定紧随其后。这一迹象表明，对科技公司行动不够迅速、未能解决他们的担忧感到失望的欧洲立法者，正在从过去依赖非约束性建议进行转变。
“改革《电子商务指令》是不可避免的，” Marietje Schaake（荷兰自由党的欧洲议会成员，专门研究数字版权）说， “大型科技平台为打击恐怖主义内容、虚假信息和侵犯版权而采取的事实上措施，已经让他们声称的“中立”变得可疑。”
运势变了
未来几个月，这种压力可能会加大，因为政治领导人看好追随科技公司和他们所依赖的法律基础。
在美国方面，这个问题在2018年的中期选举中被提上日程。共和党人已经不断指责对保守意见持有偏见的谷歌、Facebook和Twitter，他们在国会听证会上反复质问Facebook首席执行官马克·扎克伯格（Mark Zuckerberg）和其他科技高管，为什么他们仍然受到第230条的保护。特朗普也加入了抱怨的行列，指责谷歌操纵了自己的搜索结果，“控制我们能看到和不能看到的内容”。
两党都提出了进一步削弱第230条的想法，要求互联网公司对其平台上非法销售鸦片类药物负责。
“你们都觉得有什么责任吗？”上个月，参议员乔曼钦（Joe Manchin）（D-W.Va。）在参议院听证会上向Facebook首席运营官谢丽尔·桑德伯格和Twitter首席执行官杰克·多尔西提问。“很多人都受到了影响，很多人在通过y’all平台得知如何获得药物信息后死亡。”
在欧洲，法国和英国呼吁全面重新审视《电子商务指令》，以打击仇恨、种族主义和虚假信息的传播。
今年早些时候，在俄罗斯干预2017年法国总统大选之后，法国提议立法，遏制网络恶作剧和假新闻的传播。上个月，法国总理爱德华·菲利普（Edouard Philippe）公布了一项措施，惩罚那些在遏制仇恨言乱和种族主义传播方面做得不够的平台。他说，仇恨正在网络空间“不受惩罚”地蔓延，并认为唯一的解决方案是缩短企业销毁上述内容的时限——对不采取行动予以制裁。
法国数字秘书穆尼尔·马朱比（Mounir Mahjoubi）对POLITICO称，“公众舆论是如此不足，以至于人们已经准备好讨论和采取行动。” “由于这种舆论，我们不能坐下来不做出反应。如果没有这样做，政府在这个问题上就会显得软弱，我们可能会进一步危及局势。”
英国首相特里萨·梅（Theresa May）的政府也表达了类似的失望情绪，称其“正在评估修改英国在线责任制度的立法方案，”包括那些“我们离开欧盟时可能发生的变化”。这意味着，一旦英国脱离欧盟，它在制定严格的新规则方面可能比布鲁塞尔走的更远。
前英国数字部长马特·汉考克(Matt Hancock)表示，这是一个“制定一套完全适合现代社会法律的机会”。
技术行业抵抗
该行业已在多个方面大力抵抗力度。
在国会，最大的科技公司及其行业协会和盟友一直在大力游说，希望保持第230条的完整，他们担心“性交易法案”会进一步削弱该法。谷歌、Facebook和Twitter在华盛顿的影响力宣传活动上投入了数百万美元，他们在最新的游说信息披露表中都将“法律盾牌”列为优先事项。
Twitter首席执行官杰克·多尔西认为，删除第230条将消除它给那些善意尝试监管其平台公司的有限责任。因此，他说像他这样的公司将被迫对用户发布的内容采取不干涉的方式。多西尔在上月面临国会一轮听证会的前一天对POLITICO表示，“如果我们没有这种保护，我们就无法对骚扰采取任何行动，也无法改善围绕平台对话的安全性或健康。”
在美国、墨西哥和加拿大之间的新贸易协议中，科技行业在这方面取得了胜利，其中包括一项类似第230条的条款，可能会扩大科技行业在北美的法律豁免权。不过，该协议列出了“保护公共道德必要”的例外，并以美国的反性交易法案为例。该协议仍需要国会批准。
在欧洲，在议会就版权改革进行投票前期，布鲁塞尔展开了有史以来规模最大的游说活动，得到了谷歌和Mozilla等互联网公司的支持。
欧洲议会议员遭到数千封自动电子邮件的“狂轰乱炸”，这些邮件敦促他们投票否决部分版权提案，而科技游说群体则以数十万人签名的形式传阅请愿书。代表谷歌、Twitter和Facebook等互联网巨头的游说群体EDiMA在布鲁塞尔租用了贴着大量海报的汽车，鼓励法律制定者投票否决改革。
公众压力使一些立法者感到恼火。
“你不应该[译注：故意]传播这一假新闻——那么这就是它：假新闻。”欧洲议会版权改革的首席谈判代表阿克塞尔·沃斯（Axel Voss）在回应一场在线游说时说，“与其传播这种意识形态上的胡言乱语，还不如处理有效的论证。”
南希·斯科拉（Nancy Scola）和史蒂文·奥弗利（Steven Overly）为本报道做出了贡献。
U.S., Europe threaten tech industry's cherished legal 'shield'
Politico by Ashley Gold October 8, 2018
The growing legal risks could force Google, Facebook and Twitter to take a far more active role in managing content that flows through their platforms.
Policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic are threatening to dismantle laws that have allowed online giants like Google, Facebook and Twitter to flourish — a change that could force them to take a heavy hand in policing what their billions of users see on the internet.
In Washington and Brussels, a series of two-decade-old legal provisions dating to the web’s early days allow internet companies to host content posted by users without being legally responsible for it. Thanks to that immunity, U.S. companies have built massive profit engines around material such as Facebook posts, Instagram photos and YouTube videos, without having to screen them ahead of time.
But now lawmakers and regulators in the U.S. and European Union are starting to chip away at those protections, driven by growing concern about hoaxes, hate speech and other online bad behavior.
In April, President Donald Trump signed a law holding online companies liable for "knowingly" hosting content that enables sex trafficking. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress are talking about carving out a similar exception for illegal opioid sales.
In Brussels, meanwhile, the European Commission recently introduced a bill that would require sites like Facebook to take down terrorist content — Islamic State videos, for example — within an hour of being flagged by authorities, or face still-unspecified penalties. The move follows updates to EU copyright and audiovisual media laws that require platforms like YouTube and Amazon to more actively monitor for violations, including online copyright infringements and inappropriate ad placements.
The growing legal risks could force Google, Facebook and Twitter to take a far more active role in managing the content that flows through their platforms — a mammoth task given the vast numbers of tweets, snaps, blog posts, ads and other material involved. Google-owned YouTube alone posts 400 hours of user-uploaded videos each minute, and the company boasted last year that its users watch a billion hours’ worth every day.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who helped write America's tech liability provision in the 1990s, warned that the internet as we know it would cease to exist if the industry's legal protections disappear.
"If websites, ISPs, text message services, video game companies and any other type of platform were held liable for every word and deed they facilitated or somehow enabled, the entire system would shut down," Wyden told POLITICO. Without the U.S. law, "collaboration and communication on the internet would simply cease," he said.
But the tech industry's once-golden reputation has taken hits amid a series of damaging revelations, including Russia's manipulation of social media and Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica data scandal. And even tech allies like Wyden concede that if the internet giants don't do a better job of cleaning up their services, their favorable legal status is in jeopardy.
“You don’t use the sword, there’s going to be powerful interests that are going to say, 'Here’s the opportunity for us to lead an effort in the Congress to take away the shield,'" he said.
Efforts to revamp the laws underpinning tech platforms are still at an early stage and could still be derailed. But the fact that officials on both sides of the Atlantic are taking aim at the provisions — Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act in the U.S. and the EU's E-Commerce Directive — shows how much attitudes toward the major tech companies have shifted in the past few years.
Explosive growth
In the early years of the World Wide Web, as millions of ordinary people began flocking to the internet, U.S. and European policymakers saw a need to protect young online companies from lawsuits that could drive them out of business. Section 230 dates back to 1996, while the E-Commerce Directive followed in 2000.
But the landscape has changed dramatically since then. The number of internet users has exploded, reaching an estimated 3.6 billion worldwide in 2018, according to eMarketer, a digital market research firm. And giant companies like Google and Facebook — which didn't even exist when the U.S. law came into force — now dominate the advertising-driven online economy.
Politicians on both the left and right spent years lauding the tech industry and its innovative spirit. But today, many are beginning to ask why these companies, which play such a central role in society and daily life, shouldn't be regulated like, say, broadcasters or utilities. Former White House strategist Steve Bannon is among those who have called for utility-style oversight of Facebook and Google.
U.S. lawmakers kicked off the effort this year with their anti- sex-trafficking bill, which drew broad bipartisan support as Congress overrode tech companies’ resistance to any tinkering with the immunity provision.
Around the same time, the EU followed with its terrorist, copyright and media provisions. It’s a sign that European lawmakers, frustrated that tech companies aren't moving fast enough to address their concerns, are shifting from away from an old reliance on non-binding recommendations.
“Reforming the E-Commerce Directive is unavoidable,” said Marietje Schaake, a Dutch Liberals member of the European Parliament who specializes in digital rights. “De facto steps taken by big tech platforms to tackle terrorist content, disinformation and copyright infringements already make their claims of being ‘neutral’ dubious.”
Shifting fortunes
The pressure is likely to grow in the coming months, as political leaders see an upside to going after tech companies and the legal foundations on which they rest.
On the American side, the issue has gotten caught up in the 2018 midterm elections. Republicans, who have increasingly accused Google, Facebook and Twitter of being biased against conservative views, repeatedly questioned Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other tech executives at congressional hearings about why they still deserve Section 230 protections. Trump has joined the complaints, accusing Google of rigging its search results against him and "controlling what we can & cannot see."
And members of both parties have raised the idea of weakening Section 230 further by making internet companies responsible for the illegal sale of opioid drugs on their platforms.
“Do you all feel any responsibility?” Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), whose state has been hit hard by opioid abuse, asked Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey during a Senate hearing last month. “A lot of people have been affected and a lot of people have died receiving information about how to obtain drugs through y’all’s platforms.”
In Europe, France and Britain are calling for a full reopening of the E-Commerce Directive, to crack down on the spread of hate, racism and disinformation.
Early this year, France proposed legislation to curb the spread of hoaxes and fake news, in the wake of Russian meddling in the 2017 French presidential election. And last month, French Prime Minister Édouard Philippe unveiled a measure to penalize platforms that don’t do enough to stem the spread of hate speech and racism. He said hate is spreading in online spaces “with impunity” and argued that the only solution is tighter time limits for companies to take down material — with sanctions for inaction.
“Public opinion is so poor that people are ready to discuss, to take action,” France’s digital secretary, Mounir Mahjoubi, told POLITICO. “Because of this public opinion, we can’t sit around without reacting. If not, the government will seem weak on this subject and we could endanger the situation even further.”
British Prime Minister Theresa May’s government has expressed similar frustrations, saying it's "assessing legislative options to modify the online liability regime in the U.K.," including changes that "may be possible when we leave the EU.” The implication was that Britain could go further than Brussels in setting up strict new rules once it’s left the bloc as part of Brexit.
It’s an opportunity “to write a set of laws that are absolutely right for the modern times,” said former U.K. digital minister Matt Hancock.
Tech scrambling
The industry has pushed back hard on multiple fronts.
In Congress, the biggest tech brands and their trade groups and allies have furiously lobbied to keep Section 230 intact, fearing that the sex trafficking bill opened the door to further erosion of the law. Google, Facebook and Twitter, which collectively spend millions of dollars on influence campaigns in Washington, all listed the legal shield as a priority in their most recent lobbying disclosure forms.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey argued that eliminating Section 230 would erase the limited liability it gives companies that make good-faith attempts to police their platforms. As a result, he said, companies like his would be forced to take a more hands-off approach to what users publish.
“If we didn’t have that protection, we would not be able to do anything around harassment or to improve the safety or health of the conversation around the platform,” Dorsey told POLITICO the day before he faced a round of congressional hearings last month.
The tech industry scored a victory on this front in the new trade agreement among the U.S., Mexico and Canada, which includes a Section 230-like provision that could expand the tech industry's legal immunity across North America. The pact, however, outlines exceptions “necessary to protect public morals,” citing the U.S. anti-trafficking bill as an example. The agreement still requires congressional approval.
In Europe, the prelude to the parliament’s vote on the copyright changes saw one of the biggest lobbying campaigns Brussels has ever seen, backed by internet companies like Google and Mozilla.
Members of the European parliament were bombarded with thousands of automated emails urging them to vote down parts of the copyright proposal, while tech lobbying groups circulated petitions with hundreds of thousands of signatures. The lobby group EDiMA, which represents internet giants like Google, Twitter and Facebook, hired cars with massive posters pasted to them in Brussels encouraging lawmakers to vote down the changes.
The public pressure annoyed some lawmakers.
"You shouldn't spread this fake news — then this is it: fake news," said Axel Voss, the European Parliament's lead negotiator on the copyright changes, in response to one online campaign. "Instead of spreading this ideological nonsense it would be nice to deal with valid arguments."
Nancy Scola and Steven Overly contributed to this report.
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