As February’s deadline to implement the Digital Services Act is fast approaching, Berlin is lagging in doing its homework for Europe’s brand-new content moderation regulation.

The Digital Services Act (DSA) is a horizontal legislation regulating how online actors should deal with illegal and harmful content. The regulation includes a particularly strict regime for very large online platforms with more than 45 million users in the EU.

The European Commission is responsible for enforcing the rules on large platforms like Amazon, TikTok and X, for which the rules started to apply in August. For all other actors, the rules will be at the national level and will apply as of 17 February 2024.

Thus, by mid-February, EU countries are also due to complete the groundwork to start applying the new EU rules, including setting up the Digital Services Coordinator to be responsible for national enforcement actions.

Germany is currently working on the national law to implement the DSA and set up the regulator. Still, as in several other European countries, Berlin is set not to meet the deadline.

With the national law, the German government is also establishing a Digital Services Coordinator, an independent coordinating body for the implementation of the DSA.

However, according to Julian Jaursch, project manager at the New Responsibility Foundation (SNV), the German government is unlikely to meet the 17 February deadline.

“The legislative process for the DSC [digital services coordinator] will not be completed by 17 February,” Julian Jaursch told Euractiv, meaning there will be no complaints office for researchers or consumers when the DSA officially starts to bite.

At the same time, the German Digital Economy Association (BVDW) is calling on politicians to make a clear commitment to a transitional period during which companies will not be penalised.

“Only if the supervisory structure can guarantee practical and technical implementation will there be clarity and planning security for companies,” said Dirk Freytag, President of the BVDW.

“For many, it is not yet clear whether and if so, which DSA category they will fall into. The first task of the Digital Services Coordinator will be to ensure practical and technical implementation,” Freytag added.

First reading in the Bundestag

“The platforms are obliged to put a stop to this, to delete things [illegal content], to prosecute, but also to take precautions to ensure that such things do not happen and that the internet is a better place,” said Daniela Kluckert, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport, at the opening of the implementation law’s first reading.

The EU Commission had already opened infringement proceedings against X in December for breach of the DSA.

“It’s good that we have the EU at this point. Because the national authorities would be overwhelmed by the number and size of the companies,” added Kluckert.

According to the German government’s draft law, the Federal Network Agency will be responsible for monitoring providers and enforcing the DSA in Germany.

“It won’t just be a matter of us monitoring the smaller platforms in Germany, but also of the so-called Digital Services Coordinator, which in future will be the Federal Network Agency, supporting the authorities in Brussels when it comes to the large platforms in Germany,” said Jens Zimmermann, chairman of the social democratic party’s (SPD) parliamentary group in the Bundestag.

However, Catarina dos Santos-Wintz of the Christian-Democrat Union (CDU) criticised that the draft law lacked ‘clear use cases’, making it difficult for companies to fulfil their reporting obligations.

Following the debate in the Bundestag, the bill was referred to the lead committee, the Committee for Digital Affairs.

DSA: Commission asks EU countries to accelerate implementation of new digital rulebook

The European Commission adopted on Wednesday (18 October) a recommendation calling on member states to speed up the establishment of authorities to deal with illegal online content and bolster their incident response coordination.

Expert assessment

According to SNV’s Jaursch, there are still some important technical issues concerning the DSA’s supervision that need to be clarified before any real changes can be made.

One of the biggest challenges will be to find, fund and retain very good staff for the Digital Services Coordinator. The establishment of the DSC also meant new responsibilities in a new area of regulation that had not previously been the focus of work.

“This will certainly require further preparation and learning. Financial and human resources will be very important, as well as a structured and continuous dialogue with external experts from academia and civil society,” Jaursch explained.

“Despite the particularly tight budget situation in Germany, the important funding of the DSC should not be neglected,” he stressed, adding that the Federal Network Agency, is already in dialogue with the Commission and other national counterparts.

“If the current schedule works out, the German law on the implementation of the DSA could possibly come into force in April,” Jaursch added.

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