Senators propose to let users sue tech giants for harmful algos

A pair of bipartisan senators wants to hold social media giants accountable for pushing content that radicalizes Americans. Senators John Curtis (R-UT) and Mark Kelly (D-AZ) introduced the Algorithm Accountability Act Wednesday, which seeks to amend [PDF] section 230 of the Communications Decency Act to force a duty of care on …

[elsergiovolador]

Totally

That totally doesn't sound like something concocted in the bowels of Kremlin.

[Taliesinawen]

Welcome to the digital petri dish: where childhood goes to Mutate

A place where today’s youth are cultivated like rare strains of basement fungi. Kept warm, moist, and mildly deranged by a steady drip-feed of dopamine hits and existential dread. Beneath the cheery UI is a psychological minefield laid out by algorithms that won’t rest until every teenager’s value system has been pureed into a fine slurry of outrage and nihilism. Such that their sense of self dissolves into the algorithm.

[Wiretrip]

Re: Welcome to the digital petri dish: where childhood goes to Mutate

Very true. And it is the algorithm that makes these companies *publishers* not merely communications channels.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Welcome to the digital petri dish: where childhood goes to Mutate

Ahem, it's mushrooms: kept in the dark and fed shit. And that's what adults get from today's governments.

[GraXXoR]

Re: Welcome to the digital petri dish: where childhood goes to Mutate

mentioning mushroom... ladies in the White House shuffle nervously.

[IGotOut]

<Checks who owns social media companies>

Ha, ha, ha, ha ha.

Is it April fools already?

[DS999]

Yeah I'm sure

Musk and Zuck are going to be in Trump's ear (and pocket) in no time and once he tweets that he's against it the republicans will all cave to him like they always do.

[O'Reg Inalsin]

Re: Yeah I'm sure

Because a Dem administration would never ever do that? Or, once elected, would the approach pivot to being against the bill in order to protect "freedom of speech"?

[DS999]

Re: Yeah I'm sure

Previously both parties were vulnerable to lobbying, sometimes most of the money goes to one side (like the gun lobby or green energy) and sometimes it goes to both sides. But none have ever openly taken massive bribes the way Trump has in his second term.

The Supreme Court told him the law doesn't apply to him, so he's cashing in to the extent he'll be worth tens (indications are he may already be in the tens) perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars by the time he leaves office. Had he lost the election, he was in a position where paying that half billion dollar settlement to E Jean Marshall would have required him to liquidate large portions of his assets. The morons who support him will probably claim it is because he's such a great businessman lol

[Wiretrip]

Section 230 (and its international equivalents) is probably the cause of the mess we are in today with 'social' media, and its effects on society. The use of algorithms to route or channel content means that these companies are *aware* of what they are distributing, which makes them *publishers*, not conduits. Ditto the AI chatbot companies.

[Gene Cash]

No kidding. On YouTube, if you swear (or even bleep swearing!) you can get demonitized.

If you show a gun or even a gun-shaped object like a carpenter's square, your livestream won't just get demonitized, it'll get frozen.

If you put up a video saying "if you use microwave oven transformers to do plastic burning you can get killed!" like Big Clive did, not only do you get demonitized, but you also get a channel strike.

You can also get randomly demonitized for a video that's just like all your other videos. With no explanation given.

That sounds 100% like editorial control, and Section 230 should no longer apply.

The deal is companies publish user content with NO editing or changes or control and Section 230 protects them.

YouTube and other companies are trying to have their cake and eat it too.

[jfm]

<q>The deal is companies publish user content with NO editing or changes or control and Section 230 protects them.</q>

Not true. §230(c) says

(1) Treatment of publisher or speaker

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

and §230(c)(2), which is a bit wordier, confirms that moderation of posts still doesn't create civil liability.

It was passed in response to Stratton Oakmont v Prodigy, in which a court found Prodigy, who ran a bulletin board, were liable for third-party content because they moderated posts, and Cubby v CompuServe, in which CompuServe were found not liable for third-party content because they made no attempt to moderate.

Without it the Internet would be very different; if it were revoked or weakened, anyone who currently allows comments, from X to the smallest website, would have two options: shut down their comments section, or leave everything up with no attempt to moderate comments.

[James Anderson]

Big tobacco….

Big Oil, Big Pharma and now Big Tech. They have the money, they have the playbook they have the contacts in Washington ….. no way will this bill get anywhere.

[Bebu sa Ware]

"…a reasonable person would see…"

…leading to bodily injury or death, in a way that "a reasonable person would see as foreseeable and attributable to the algorithm."

Finding twelve "reasonable persons" in contemporary US is only ever likely to becpossible if a Clapton omnibus with the pub darts team on a day trip were to take the wrong turning at Land's End and wash up on the east coast of the Trumpisstani caliphate.