Authored by Senator Alessandro Vieira (MDB-SE), the text was reported in the House by Deputy Jadyel Alencar (Republicans-PI) obliges platforms to adopt measures against abuse on the Internet
The Bill (PL) 2,628 of 2022 entered the agenda of the This week after the repercussion of the influencer video which denounced the use of profiles in With children and adolescents in situations considered inappropriate for age in order to get engagement and monetization of their channels. Authored by Senator Alessandro Vieira (MDB-SE), the bill was reported in the House by Deputy Jadyel Alencar (Republicans-PI) and has the support of hundreds of civil society organizations that work with the protection of children and adolescents in Brazil.
Among the measures, the text requires digital platforms to take “reasonable” measures to prevent risks of children and adolescents access illegal content or considered inappropriate for these age groups. In addition, PL provides for rules for supervising parents and guardians and requires more reliable mechanisms to verify the age of social networks, which is currently done basically by self -declaration.
The matter still disciplines the use of advertising; the collection and treatment of personal data of children and adolescents; Establishes rules for electronic games, prohibits gaming exposure; and provides for the public power to comply with the legislation. The Digital Rights Lawyer of the Consumer Protection Institute (Idec) Marina Fernandes explained to Agência Brasil that the PL adapts rights that are already foreseen in the Child and Adolescent Statute [ECA]but they are not usually applied to social networks. The organization is part of the Network Rights Coalition.
“PL creates a regulation ecosystem for digital platforms in relation to children and adolescents. The project determines that the platforms have more duties and obligations. Initially, in Article 5, for example, it brings that the platforms should prevent childhood damage.”
Prevent risks
With 40 articles and known as ECA Digital, the bill determines in its article 6 that digital platforms must adopt measures to “prevent and mitigate risks” of children and adolescents access content that involves, among other points, exploitation and sexual abuse; physical violence; Harassment; Virtual Bullying; incentive for addiction behaviors; or promotion and marketing of gambling; alcoholic beverages and smoking. The PL also states the project does not exempt the responsibility of the country, tutors or those who benefit financially from the production and public distribution of content with children and adolescents.
In cases of non -compliance with the legislation, the project provides for warnings with corrective measures within 30 days. Infringement, a fine of up to 10% of the economic group’s revenues in Brazil may be applied or, in the absence of revenues, of up to R $ 50 million. It will also be possible to temporarily suspend or ban the activities of digital platforms in case the infractions are not corrected.
Age group
The bill also requires platforms to evaluate the content that is distributed to children and adolescents according to the age group and indicate “extensively” to all users about the indicative classification for the disclosed content. To prevent children’s access to inappropriate content, the project states that digital platforms should adopt “reliable age verification mechanisms with each user access, prohibiting self -declaration.”
Idec lawyer Marina Fernandes said that even the platforms stating that networks are not for children under 13, there are no measures to mitigate this access today. “They have no supervision about the true age of those users. And they know that there are children under 13 accessing. There are content focused on children under 13 years. What PL brings in the age check chapter is that they would be required to do a reliable check,” he said.
Parental Supervision
Another important chapter of the project regulates the supervision of parents or guardians in the use of social networks by adolescents. According to the text, platforms should “make available and easy -to -use configurations and tools that support parental supervision.” Organizations like the goal inform you that they have this service. However, Idec expert Marina Fernandes points out that this type of tool is not yet efficient.
“Many times, parents do not know how to use it because it is difficult to find these tools. Many of them are far short of what is needed because they are linked to the design of the platform that is built to vitiate or not allows parents to disable harmful content,” he explained. According to Fernandes, the PL presents a list of requirements to make supervision more effective. “It is very easy to say that the family is responsible, but sometimes the family is unable to act because they do not have enough information to act,” he added.
Among the measures provided for in the project is the offer of “features that allow to limit and monitor the use time of the product or service” by parents or guardians. The document also says that digital service providers “should ensure that users or accounts of children and adolescents up to 16 years old are linked to the user or account of one of their legal guardians.”
Advertising
The bill also brings a series of rules for the direction of advertising for children and adolescents. “The use of profile techniques to target commercial advertising to children and adolescents is prohibited, as well as the use of emotional analysis, augmented reality, extended reality and virtual reality for this purpose,” says Article 22. In Article 25, the creation of children and adolescents for advertising purposes, using personal data collection from under 18 years. “The PL specifically prohibits that data from children and adolescents is used for commercial perfilization, that is, to send publicity to these children and adolescents,” explained Marina Fernandes.
Public power
The PL also states that the Government may act to regulate the mechanisms provided for in the legislation. “Executive Branch Act will regulate the minimum requirements of transparency, safety and interoperability for age measurement mechanisms and parental supervision adopted by operating systems and application stores,” says the rapporteur’s opinion.
Opposition
PL 2628 finds resistance from opposition led by the new and PL in the House of Representatives. PL leader, Mrs Caroline de Toni (PL-SC), classified the text as an attempt to censor social networks and said she was sought by digital platform representatives that claimed “over-regulation.” “Laws already exist to punish. What we need is to improve the legal system and improve this integration [das policias com as plataformas]. These are specific measures to facilitate and give legal certainty, not wanting to use it as a pretext to censor the freedom of expression of social networks, ”he said
Sought by Agência Brasil, the goal (owner of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp) did not comment on the PL 2628 until the close of this report. The digital council, an organization that brings together the giants of Meta, Google, Tiktok, Amazon technology, among others, has manifested itself asking for changes in the text. When the theme was in the Senate, the Digital Council criticized what it called excessive obligations.
“The balance between the removal of harmful content and the preservation of freedom of expression becomes a delicate point. The imposition of excessively rigorous obligations to the platforms can encourage the indiscriminate removal of legitimate content,” said the organization that represents most of the main active big techs in Brazil.
*With information from Agência Brasil
