Tech firms face anger over legal protections

Brooding over family photos, Jessica Watt Dougherty expresses her sadness at the death of her father – whom she attributes to misinformation on an online platform, an issue at the heart of a tangled US debate on tech regulation.

The US Supreme Court this week will hear high-stakes cases that will determine the fate of Section 230, a decades-old legal provision that protects platforms from lawsuits over content posted by their users.

The cases, which are part of several nationwide lawsuits regulating internet content, could shake platforms and significantly reset online language doctrines if stripped of their legal immunity.

“I watched my father die through the screen of my phone,” Dougherty, an Ohio school counselor, told AFP.

Her father, 64-year-old Randy Watt, refused to be vaccinated and died alone in a hospital last year after battling Covid-19.

After his death, his family discovered he was living a secret virtual life on Gab, a far-right platform observers describe as a petri dish full of misinformation and conspiracy theories.

His Gab activities explained to his vaccinated family members why he decided not to vaccinate against Covid-19, a decision that ultimately had fatal consequences.

The impact of vaccination misinformation on Gab was also apparent after Watt drove himself to the hospital and created what he called a “sickness log,” documenting for his followers how he was treating himself for the coronavirus.

He wrote that he was taking drugs like ivermectin, which US health officials say are ineffective and, in some cases, dangerous for treating Covid-19. Gab, which has millions of followers, is full of posts promoting ivermectin.

“I have a very, very strong belief that the content (about Gab) is sloppy and disrespectful and racist and scary,” Dougherty said.

“My father spent a lot of time practically surrounded by people with ideas that the pandemic is a hoax, Covid is fake, the vaccine is unsafe, the vaccine is deadly… Those are the belief systems that (he) has adopted.”

Such claims that platforms are responsible for false or harmful user content are at the heart of Supreme Court cases.

The most closely watched case will be heard on Tuesday. A grieving family is claiming that Google-owned YouTube is responsible for the death of a US citizen in the 2015 Paris attacks claimed by the group Islamic State (IS).

Her relatives have accused YouTube of recommending jihadist videos to users and thus contributing to the violence.

And on Wednesday, the same judges will consider a similar case involving the victim of an IS attack on a nightclub in Turkey, but this time asking whether platforms should be subject to anti-terrorist laws despite their legal immunity.

The court’s verdict is expected by June 30.

Platform lobbyists fear a spate of lawsuits if the court rules in favor of victims’ families, a decision that could fundamentally change the internet.

Platforms are “not going to get every single call right,” said Matt Schruers, president of the Computer & Communications Industry Association, which represents America’s largest tech companies.

“When courts penalize companies that miss needles in a haystack, it sends a ‘don’t look’ signal and it makes the internet a cesspool of dangerous content,” he told AFP.

Or, Schruers added, it could prompt the world’s largest platforms to over-filter, seriously restricting the flow of free speech online.

But a change could provide a way for Watt’s relatives to seek justice from Gab, whose founder Andrew Torba previously urged the US government to keep Section 230 “exactly as it is”.

“We try to protect freedom of expression online,” Torba wrote in a 2020 open letter to former President Donald Trump.

“Section 230 is the only thing standing between us and an avalanche of lawsuits from activist groups and foreign governments who don’t like what our millions of users and readers have to say.”

Founded in 2016, Gab has become a haven for white supremacists and conspiracy theories targeting Jews, LGBTQ people and minorities, the Stanford Internet Observatory wrote in a report.

Even among the fringe platforms beset by misinformation, Gab stands out for its blanket refusal to “remove the most extreme racist, violent and bigoted content,” according to the report.

Dougherty noticed the same thing when she created an account on Gab after her father’s death.

“You can’t scream fire in a crowded theater,” she said.

“We cannot say things that harm other people. In a crowded theater on Gab, there are many people screaming fire.”