The Need to Reform Section 230
Section 230 is a section of Title 47 United States Telecommunications Decency Act, which provides immunity to internet site operators for third party content. It was part of the 1996 Telecommunications Act when the commercial internet was nascent and did not resemble the social media laden landscape that occupies screen time today. Given the recent coverage of Facebook’s issues with their Instagram platform and their inability to enforce their own terms of service related to abuse and false information, as well as their need to assemble a panel of “experts” to determine if former President Trump should be ban from their platform for inciting violence. Clearly, they cannot regulate their operations and the intended “good Smartian screening of offensive content” aspect of section 230 has not met its intended purpose. As Megan Hauer pointed out in her Senate testimony, “algorithms should not be protected by section 230 ” Humans do engineer algorithms, but history has shown that bad actors have been able to leverage and distort those algorithms to play to individuals confirmation bias and/or mental health issues. Just as with the Pandemic, we need to follow the science and data and leverage these facts to regulate operators to make the internet a safer and healthier place. I am generally not an advocate for more government regulation, but in the case of Facebook’s recent issues there is mounting evidence that there needs to be more oversight and provide legal remedies to individuals that have been adversely impacted by bad actors and lame operators. It is time for we the people to call on our government to change the law and reform section 230. It is time for the regulations to mature as the internet has. Contact your representative . Breaking up a business is not the answer, enforce and updating the law is.