Public Ministry charges Google after offensive against Fake News PL – 05/02/2023 – Power

The Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office in São Paulo issued an official letter this Monday (1st) demanding explanations from Google about the platform’s offensive against the Fake News PL.

As reported by the Sheet, a survey by NetLab, from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, indicates that the company has prioritized content contrary to its approval in search results over the bill. It has also been posting warnings on YouTube about “negative impact” to creators and messaging youtubers about it.

A Sheetthis Monday, Google denied that it is privileging links against the PL in its search engine and stated that its ranking systems apply to all web pages, including those it administers.

The company, also this Monday, fixed a link just below the search box on its website with the words: “The bill of fake news can make your internet worse”. The link takes you to a Google blog post with numerous criticisms of the project.

A document signed by attorney Yuri Corrêa da Luz gives a ten-day period for Google to respond on the criteria for search results on PL 2630. the conclusions of the NetLab survey.

The measure takes place within a civil inquiry already initiated at the Regional Attorney for Citizens’ Rights on the subject of fake news.

The same document from the Public Ministry also requests information from Meta, owner of Facebook and Instagram, about ads paid by Google on its platforms related to the Fake News PL.

According to the data site Statista, 97% of Brazilians use Google for internet searches.

On a social network, the Minister of Justice, Flávio Dino, posted an image of the Google page with a link to the PL and said that he would forward the case for analysis by the National Consumer Secretariat, from his portfolio, “in view of the possibility of configuring practices corporate abuses”.

The Fake News PL can be voted on this Tuesday (2) in the House, but the President of the House, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), is considering postponing the consideration of the matter because of the risk of defeat.

The project, among other points, brings a series of obligations to providers of social networks and messaging applications, such as content moderation. After the January 8 attacks, the Lula government prepared a proposal that obliges the networks to remove material that incites a coup d’état and forwarded it to congressman Orlando Silva.

The Marco Civil da Internet, in force since 2014, exempts platforms from liability for damages generated by third-party content. The project under discussion makes one more exception to these rules.