Bart Custers on tech companies involved in criminal activities
Governments are increasingly cracking down on tech companies like X, Telegram and Clearview that flout the law, with a fine, ban or criminal prosecution. In practice, however, this has little effect. A tougher stance is needed, argues Bart Custers, Professor of Law and Data Science at eLaw – Center for Law and Digital Technology, in Dutch newspaper ‘Volkskrant’.
In Brazil, the Supreme Court has banned X (formerly Twitter) because the platform had failed to tackle fake news and hate speech. In France, Telegram's top boss was arrested for doing nothing about money laundering and the distribution of child pornography through the platform. In the Netherlands, Clearview is being fined more than €30 million for illegally collecting 30 billion photos of people. It is clear that this crackdown on tech companies that don't play by the rules is on the rise. Yet companies continue to systematically ignore the rules.
These companies are evading their responsibility, instead choosing to pursue legal action and ignore the rules. The reason is simple: it would cost them a great deal of money to comply with the rules. However, says Custers, an organisation that earns money by deliberately breaking the law qualifies as a criminal organisation. A firm criminal law approach might be the answer to stop the illegal activities.
See the website of Volkskrant for the article (in Dutch, 16 September).