Under the Digital Services Act platforms are forced to comply with removal requests for content which is deemed in violation of the regulation.
According to the "DSA Transparency Database"[1], approximately 1.2 million pieces of content are removed daily (at least in terms of their visibility inside the EU) because they fall into the category of "Illegal or harmful speech", the reason being "online services are being misused by manipulative algorithmic systems to amplify the spread of disinformation"[2].
Ironically, algorithms are heavily used to perform automated decision-making on the type of content that is being removed. Platforms are subject to heavy fines for not complying (so it's better to remove more stuff than otherwise), and there's no transparency in the process.
What's the content that is actually removed? A couple of people I occasionally watch on YouTube have had their content removed and/or their channel demonetized under the DSA for completely fine content (expressing opinions contrary to the current EU politics), and this is really worrying. Is there any way to get qualitative data about the removals instead of just aggregated? Is there any organization that is working on this?
Anyone else sharing my worries here?
[1] https://transparency.dsa.ec.europa.eu/dashboard
[2] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/digital-services-act-package
