Capitol Hill clashed with Silicon Valley Wednesday over legal protections and censorship on social media during a fiery hearing a week before Election Day in …
Capitol Hill clashed with Silicon Valley Wednesday over legal protections and censorship on social media during a fiery hearing a week before Election Day in which Twitter’s Jack Dorsey acknowledged that platforms need to do more to «earn trust.» Dorsey — along with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google chief Sundar Pichai — had been summoned to the Senate to testify via video link to debate a law known as Section 230 that shields their platforms from liability over what their users post. With the election looming, tech executives have been facing increased pressure to shield users from the rapid propagation of false information while staying above the political fray. The delicate balancing act has angered Republicans, however, who distrust Silicon Valley over what they see the suppression of conservative voices and Democrats who worry that the platforms are not doing enough on disinformation. «My concern is that these platforms have become powerful arbiters of what is true and what content users can access,» said Roger Wicker, the Republican chairman of the Commerce Committee. The senator said the panel had «dozens of examples of conservative content being censored,» questioning Dorsey on how that platform decides on how to label or remove content. «Your platform allows foreign dictators to post propaganda without restriction yet your routinely restrict the president of the United States,» Wicker said, pointing to one message in China accusing the US military of introducing the coronavirus. Right on cue, President Donald Trump, who faces an uphill battle for reelection on November 3, served up his own critique, taking to Twitter to accuse Big Tech of covering up the «corruption» of his opponent Joe Biden.
