With the appropriate safeguards, the&nbsp;<a href="https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digital-age/digital-services-act_en">Digital Services Act (DSA)</a>, and in particular the&nbsp;<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/13817-Delegated-Regulation-on-data-access-provided-for-in-the-Digital-Services-Act_en">delegated act on access to data</a>, constitutes the biggest opportunity to push for social media platform transparency on the type of content they retain and for how long, for accountability. Article 40(4) of the DSA allows for vetted researchers to obtain access to offline data, including removed content, from platforms to research systemic risks to fundamental rights in the EU stemming from platform functioning (e.g. algorithm failures). As platforms cannot give access to removed data they have not retained, the DSA delegated act offers a unique opportunity to push for increased transparency of platform data retention policies, a crucial step for DSA research and international justice.&nbsp;On 10 December 2024, Mnemonic&nbsp;<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/13817-Delegated-Regulation-on-data-access-provided-for-in-the-Digital-Services-Act/F3498935_en">responded</a> to the European Commission’s call for feedback on the draft delegated act for data access under article 40(4) of the DSA. As Mnemonic has consistently reported over the years, high volumes of critical human rights content uploaded from conflict zones is taken down by platforms at speed and at scale using automation at a high error rate. This means that potential evidence of serious human rights violations, war crimes, and crimes against humanity is often over-removed. However, with the increased use of takedown algorithms to remove content at speed, often this content is taken down before it can be archived. It is crucial that platform content retention processes are strengthened so that this content can still be used for accountability.As argued in Mnemonic’s submission (see also the&nbsp;<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/13817-Delegated-Regulation-on-data-access-provided-for-in-the-Digital-Services-Act/F3423859_en">previous submission</a> by WITNESS), data retention and preservation should be given further consideration in the delegated act for content that has been removed by social media platforms when motive for its removal is the qualification of the content as illegal or as violating community guidelines, and this content is related to situations of widespread human rights abuses or armed conflict.&nbsp;We therefore ask the European Commission to strengthen the draft delegated act by:<ul><li>Adding a minimum of five year data retention timeframe in the delegated act would provide a realistic and transparent data retention timeframe, increasing clarity for comprehensive research data. Research and investigations into systemic risks can take time and often require historic data, yet currently, there is no transparency on data retention timeframes. Similarly, research into human rights violations and international crimes can involve events taken a decade prior and take years to conclude (see e.g. Mnemonic’s Syrian Archive’s&nbsp;<a href="https://syrianarchive.org/en/investigations/french-court-of-appeal-validates-historic-arrest-warrant-for-syrian-president-bashar-al-assad-a-legal-milestone-and-important-victory-for-survivors">decade long contribution</a> to the arrest warrants issued in France against former Syrian President Al-Assad). Law enforcement authorities can request an extension of retention periods for specific content, but this procedure is not currently available for civil society organisations who are instrumental in identifying information for case selection.</li><li>Explicitly including non-EU content in data access processes. This is beneficial for the DSA framework as algorithm failures leading to ineffective content moderation of non-EU content also constitute a systemic risk against fundamental freedoms in the EU such as freedom of expression, human dignity, and non-discrimination. EU citizens are still exposed to non-EU content which can misinform EU public debate, contribute to discrimination against diaspora or activist communities in the EU, or even enable EU citizens’ participation in later crimes and abuse. By specifically listing non-EU content in the delegated act, platforms would need to apply the same transparent retention timeframes to such content. This would additionally facilitate access to justice in the EU for international crimes under the principle of universal jurisdiction.&nbsp;</li></ul>Doing so would bring important data retention and content triage needs to the forefront, and set important precedent and standards for other regions and languages, affecting social media users more globally, especially those in conflict zones.Read Mnemonic’s full submission to the European Commission&nbsp;<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/13817-Delegated-Regulation-on-data-access-provided-for-in-the-Digital-Services-Act/F3498935_en">here</a>.For further engagement, please contact Maria Mingo, Policy and Advocacy Manager at&nbsp;<a href="mailto:maria@mnemonic.org">maria@mnemonic.org</a>.&nbsp;

DSA data access: An opportunity for evidence retention

.css-68jq5d{padding-bottom:1.45rem;color:#ffffff;-webkit-transition:0.25s;transition:0.25s;}.css-68jq5d:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}BLOG

DSA data access: An opportunity for evidence retention

BLOG