On Wednesday, US Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo) introduced a bill that would that would limit the immunity granted in Section 230 of the communications Decency Act and would make it easier for Americans to sue big tech companies who are acting in bad faith.
Limiting Section 230 Immunity to Good Samaritans Act was introduced by Hawley and was cosponsored by Senators Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Mike Braun (R-Ind.), Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), and Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.).
- Users could sue the major Big Tech companies for breaching their contractual duty of good faith;
- The duty of good faith would contractually prohibit Big Tech from:
- Discriminating when enforcing the terms of service they write (just like police and prosecutors are not supposed to discriminate when enforcing the law);
- Failing to honor their promises;
- Big Tech companies who breach their duty of good faith would have to pay $5,000 or actual damages, whichever is higher, plus attorney’s fees to each user who prevails.
The bill would only apply to websites or mobile apps with more than 30 million users in the US in a month or 300 million worldwide and have more than $1.5 billion in global revenue.
“For too long, Big Tech companies like Twitter, Google and Facebook have used their power to silence political speech from conservatives without any recourse for users. Section 230 has been stretched and rewritten by courts to give these companies outlandish power over speech without accountability. Congress should act to ensure bad actors are not given a free pass to censor and silence their opponents.” — Senator Josh Hawley
Senator Rubio said, “Recent actions by Big Tech call into question the legal immunities that social media companies enjoy under Section 230 and whether these firms live up to their obligations. It is time to take a fresh look at the statute and clarify the vague standard of ‘good faith’ for which technology companies receive legal protections. That is exactly what this bill does. While Section 230 serves an important purpose, it should not protect unrelated activities such as censorship and political activism.”
To read the proposed bill, click here.
1 comment
Seems like lots of tech employees who got to CA from other states to work for Silicon Valley companies, have broken their lease and left the state for home. They can work online now and no need to maintain an expensive tiny apartment when they can save that money.
Comments are closed.