In 2021, Frances Haugen, a former Meta Platforms employee, leaked internal documents revealing that the company knew Instagram was worsening body image issues among teenagers but downplayed the problem publicly. Her testimony before the European Parliament in November 2021 sparked a broader debate about what digital platforms can and should do to protect users' rights.
But what exactly are digital rights, and how vulnerable are users online? Euronews Tech Talks gathered audience questions and put them to Gloria González Fuster, a research professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel specialising in digitalisation and rights, and Silvia Semenzin, a researcher at the European non-profit AI Forensics with a background in digital sociology.
What Are Digital Rights?
Digital rights are an informal term for the rights people hold when they are online. These include traditional human rights such as freedom of expression and the right to private life, as González Fuster explained. However, just as in offline settings, some groups are more vulnerable to having these rights violated. Semenzin noted that women, LGBTQ+ individuals, migrants, and people discriminated against for ethnicity or religion are disproportionately affected.
Abuses can be overt, like the Italian Facebook group Mia Moglie, where 32,000 members shared intimate images of their wives without consent for six years. Other forms of discrimination are subtler, such as algorithms that erase certain minority groups from users' feeds. “Algorithms decide whose voices are more visible, whose story receives more attention, who gets to talk and who gets to be censored,” Semenzin said.
What Can Platforms Do?
Content moderation is one key tool for making social media safer. However, major platforms lack transparency about how moderation works. Semenzin explained that both humans and automated tools are involved, but the exact numbers and training methods remain unclear. “The real answer is that we would need much more transparency regarding these processes,” she added.
What Can Governments Do?
Governments can impose regulations. The European Union has several laws addressing platform safety, including the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which applies whenever personal data is processed. González Fuster noted that GDPR gives data subjects rights and establishes data protection authorities to monitor compliance. Yet enforcement is slow, as Big Tech firms often contest sanctions. “We have been told for a long time, ‘wait, it will work eventually,’ but it is taking quite a lot of time to see a direct impact,” she said.
The EU AI Act, which entered into force in 2024, has already modified parts of GDPR, and further changes are being considered under the digital Omnibus package in Brussels. González Fuster warned that these amendments are risky: “Because we all want to use AI, we have to be especially careful and be more careful than ever with what we do with personal data.”
Meanwhile, some member states are taking their own steps. UK Police Chiefs Call for Ban on Under-16s Using Social Media and Messaging Apps, reflecting growing concern about children's safety online.
What Can Users Do?
Users can exercise their rights by asking platforms what data they hold. González Fuster said, “We all have the right to ask social media companies, ‘What information do you have about me? What do you think I am?’” However, obtaining this data requires time and effort, and she stressed that “it should not be for normal people to be defending themselves continuously online.”
The broader challenge remains: balancing innovation with accountability. As the EU continues to refine its digital rulebook, the effectiveness of these measures will depend on enforcement and transparency.
