Government Mandates to Remove Content Are Ineffective, Costly, and Anti-Competitive

Germany passed NetzDG in 2017, which imposed high fines for social media networks with 2 million or more registered users. The law requires social media networks to review all complaints and remove designated categories of content within 24 hours, and if they do not comply, the network may be fined up to €50 million euros (or $54 million) for noncompliance.

The law also requires social media networks to provide forms for users to submit complaints about user-generated content, and social media networks that receive more than 100 complaints must publish reports twice a year in German on how they handled NetzDG complaints. Some lawmakers in the U.S. have hinted at proposing similar legislation, which would introduce high compliance costs for social media companies and impose prescriptive mandates on the U.S. digital economy.