14 DAY TRIAL // France and the United Kingdom are taking into consideration some fines for social media companies as a way to put extra pressure on them to take action against terrorist content.
Of course, most social media companies are already doing quite a bit to take down extremist content, closing accounts left and right once they are reported.
That's not enough, however, for these two countries have announced that they will discuss the proposed measures in a meeting between UK Prime Minister Theresa May and French President Emmanuel Macron.
May's office says the purpose of this campaign is to "ensure that the Internet cannot be used as a safe space for terrorists and criminals." This, of course, has been part of May's rhetoric for a while now, although she has yet to propose a way to keep out those with ill intentions while letting innocent people free.
She is said to discuss with Macron about the possibility of creating a new legal liability for tech companies if they fail to remove content.
The constant pressure
There's been a constant pressure from European countries on the likes of Facebook, Twitter and Google to get more involved in regulating the Internet, removing hate speech and terrorist content online. However, there are many concerns that this would infringe on free speech and that many discussions could be misinterpreted. Furthermore, this would also imply that these companies don't act on reports made by other people, but on closely monitoring their networks for key words, which infringes on people's right to some semblance of privacy.
May has called for stricter rules regarding the Internet after the terrorist attacks in London and Manchester. Previously, following one of the attacks, the government slammed WhatsApp for the end-to-end encryption it provides to users after authorities were unable to read the attacker's last messages.
"The counter-terrorism cooperation between British and French intelligence agencies is already strong, but President Macron and I agree that more should be done to tackle the terrorist threat online. We are united in our total condemnation of terrorism and our commitment to stamp out this evil," Theresa May said.