The Supreme Court agreed to take up two cases that could challenge Big Tech companies’ legal protections.
The court agreed on Monday to take up Gonzalez v. Google and Twitter v. Taamneh, cases that could allow the court to change Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, legislation that protects websites on the internet from being held liable for the content posted by users. Recently the law has come under fire from conservatives claiming that it allows websites to censor them with impunity.
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Gonzalez v. Google specifically relates to a lawsuit from Reynaldo Gonzalez, who sued Google under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act after his daughter was killed during a 2015 Islamic State attack in Paris. Gonzalez claimed that Google assisted ISIS by hosting its recruitment videos on YouTube and argued that Google “recommended ISIS videos to users” via its algorithm, thus making it liable for helping the terrorist organization.
Lower courts had ruled in Google’s favor, saying that it was protected by Section 230 due to a broad interpretation in which Google isn’t treated as liable due to ISIS creating the content and the algorithm treating the videos the same way as others.
Google has pushed back on this petition. “This Court should not lightly adopt a reading of section 230 that would threaten the basic organizational decisions of the modern internet,” Google said in its brief.
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Tech advocacy groups have had mixed responses about how the court’s ruling could affect content moderation practices. “These cases show the importance of content moderation. Without moderation, the internet will become a content cesspool, filled with vile content of all sorts and making it easier for things like terrorist recruitment,” NetChoice counsel Chris Marchese said.
Others noted that significant changes to the section of the Communications Decency Act could have significant effects on smaller organizations. “Section 230 is the foundation that today’s internet is built on, supporting both speech online and the ability of internet platforms to take down harmful content,” Chamber of Progress CEO Adam Kovacevich said. “Eroding that wouldn’t just impact large platforms — it would hammer smaller websites, from community newspapers to niche blogs.”
