Starting this Wednesday (4), the Federal Supreme Court (STF) is expected to judge 12 appeals presented by big techs and entities in the technology sector that ask for clarifications and adjustments to the decision that increased the platforms' responsibility for the content they publish. One of the main questions asked is when the understanding adopted by the Supreme Court should be applied, as companies ask that the rules only become valid after all chances of appeals in court have closed. In June last year, by 8 votes to 3, the STF declared the partial unconstitutionality of article 19 of the Marco Civil da Internet. The plenary analyzed two appeals that discussed the validity of this section of the norm. The article says that "the internet application provider can only be held civilly liable for damages resulting from content generated by third parties" if, after a court order, it "does not take measures" to remove the content. The majority of the Supreme Court established as a general rule that digital platforms are responsible for the content published by the user and must be held responsible if they do not remove illicit or criminal posts from the air. The STF decision The Supreme Court ministers decided that article 19 "does not provide sufficient protection" for fundamental rights and, therefore, must be interpreted in such a way that providers are subject to civil liability. In practice, when a post constitutes a crime or illegal act, the victim or their representative can directly contact the platform and request removal. If, after this notification, the network does not remove the post, it will be responsible for any damage the post causes. If the court considers that the post was irregular, the network will have to compensate the victim. In the case of crimes against honor – insult, slander and defamation – withdrawal depends on a court decision. In these situations, there is the possibility of removal by extrajudicial notification, that is, direct notification to the platform by the victim or lawyer, when there are repeated posts of content already considered illegal by the courts. Companies will respond for illegal content disseminated through paid advertisements and boosts and for the dissemination of this content by robots. The Supreme Court also established that companies must have a duty of care for the content published. This means that they will have to immediately remove, on their own, content containing crimes considered serious. Features Ministers must begin to judge the so-called embargoes for clarification that ask for clarifications about obscurity, inaccuracy, contradiction or omission in the decision. The expectation is that the judgment will not generate major changes to the already established thesis. The president of the STF, Edson Fachin, stated that the idea is to "start and end" this week. Among the resources are questions from Facebook, Google, Sleeping Giants Brasil and the Brazilian Institute for Consumer Protection. ➡️Facebook asks the Supreme Court to make it clear that the decision will only take effect for events that occur after the end of the trial in the Court and that companies have a period of six months to implement all obligations. Another demand is for ministers to clarify the concept of presumption of corporate responsibility. This is because, according to the company, the use of the expression 'presumption of responsibility' "could lead to the interpretation that the civil liability of internet application providers would not depend on the verification of the requirements of fault, damage and causal link". ➡️Google already points out that it is not clear the minimum requirements that extrajudicial removal notifications must present to guarantee their credibility, analysis and action taken by the provider, such as the legitimacy of the applicant and the description of the alleged offense. The company says that it is necessary to make it clear that the Court's thesis only applies to future cases, to avoid disparate conclusions in lower courts and the multiplication of appeals. ➡️Sleeping Giants Brasil argues that it is necessary to clarify the objective parameters that define 'diligent action', 'timeliness' and the concept of 'artificial distribution network' to define the responsibility of digital platforms. And what is the Executive's duty in implementing, regulating and monitoring the Court's decision, in addition to how the decision will be applied to processes that are ongoing in Justice. ➡️Internetlab Association for Research in Law and Technology stated that platforms need to understand how they can demonstrate the adoption of appropriate measures to comply with the duty of care. ➡️The Brazilian Association of Investigative Journalism (Abraji) maintains that there is a lack of definition of which types of providers are subject to the new rules, as the thesis only mentions some categories of platforms, in addition to the absence of reference to micro-enterprises, small companies and platforms with less than 10 million users. It also questions the lack of definition regarding what information platforms can require from those who request the removal of content and who is entitled to make these notifications. ➡️The Brazilian Institute of Consumer Protection says that the Supreme Court's understanding does not prevent the objective liability regime of the Consumer Protection Code from being applied to consumer relations established within the scope of marketplaces. The STF's decision will have to be followed by all judges and courts in Brazil. This will be valid until the National Congress enacts a specific law on the duties of platforms and the protection of people. Decrees Find out what changes with the new rules for operating digital platforms in Brazil After the STF's decision, in May, the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) issued two decrees that create new rules for the operation of social networks. The first detailed providers' duties regarding content moderation, transparency, security of services and mitigation of the massive circulation of criminal content. The other establishes guidelines for combating violence against women in the digital environment, with an obligation to make unauthorized intimate content unavailable within two hours after notification and measures against intimate deepfakes generated by AI. It was also decided that it is up to the National Data Protection Agency, linked to the Ministry of Justice, to monitor whether the platforms are complying with the rules imposed by the Court.