The new European centre will focus on decoding algorithmic black boxes, becoming an international hub for research in the field in order to support the application of EU digital rules.

The European Centre for Algorithmic Transparency officially opened its doors on Tuesday (18 April) in Sevilla. The Spanish city is the fourth largest in terms of numbers of EU officials resident there, as it is home to the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission’s in-house research service.

As a branch of the JRC, the algorithmic centre will support the EU executive in one of the most arduous tasks of the coming years: turning its swooping digital legislation from text to practice by policing some of the wealthiest and most influential companies in the world.

“The world is watching us. And this is an interesting but also challenging place to be because we could be, if we do it well, a source of inspiration,” said Renate Nikolay at the shining conference centre in Las Setas, in the heart of Sevilla, before Spain’s state secretary for digital Carme Artigas and the city’s mayor Antonio Muñoz.

Nikolay was head of the cabinet of Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová before landing as Deputy Director General of the Commission’s digital department. She is also a top candidate to take over the department’s highest post as Roberto Viola, who has been the Director General for nearly a decade, is set to retire next year.

Digital rules enforcement

“We have to show that we are not only good at adopting rules but actually also at bringing about change. Real change,” Nikolay added, stressing that the objective is to change platforms’ harmful behaviour by holding them accountable.

The new centre’s first task will be providing scientific and technological expertise to the Commission to enforce the Digital Services Act (DSA). The flagship legislation introduces a particularly strict regime for very large online platforms like Facebook and Twitter, which will be under the direct supervision of the European Commission.

Based on the new EU digital rulebook, platforms that can pose a ‘systemic risk’ to society will have to implement a risk management mechanism, providing an annual assessment of their risk and adopting mitigation measures subject to external audits.

“Recommender systems are essentially moderating our societal discourse: they determine what news we see, what political or cultural group we might join, they are influencing how we vote,” said Krishna Gummadi of the European Lab for Learning and Intelligent Systems.

Knowledge is power

Gummadi stressed the importance of independent research on the ethical implications of algorithms, citing examples where researches unveiled biases in predictive policing tools in the United States, price discrimination on online marketplaces, gender biases on job sites, and polarising ‘filter bubbles’ on social media.

Despite these initial efforts, algorithms’ internal working and effects on society remain a largely under-researched subject and a fast-moving target. That’s where the new algorithm centre comes in.

The new expertise centre is meant to provide a methodology and documentation for enforcing the new rules on algorithms in relation to issues such as mental health, discrimination, hate speech and disinformation.

“If you want to regulate digital services, you need to understand how algorithms work,” an EU official said.

Tasks would include analysing the training datasets to ensure they are not biased in favour or against a specific demographic and proposing technical measures to comply with the DSA.

The question of capacity

“We are still at the start-up phase,” admitted Stephen Quest, JRC’s Director General.

The new centre will count on 10 people from the JRC, plus 20 new hires spanning from IT experts to social scientists, for which the Commission boasted of having received over 500 applications. While the research service will cover the administrative costs, the staff costs will be covered with the DSA’s supervisory fee.

These figures seem dwarfed by the tasks ahead. The Commission currently estimates between 20 and 25 very large online platforms, corresponding to roughly one staff member per platform of the likes of TikTok and Google.

Regarding capacity, Quest reassured attendees that the algorithm centre will not work in isolation but will be a ‘catalyser’ for the research community, building up partnerships with public bodies, research centres and experts.

The first partnership forged is with the Pôle d’expertise de la régulation numérique (PEReN), a French body that supports policymakers but also regulators in the field of data protection, consumer protection and competition.

Gerard de Graaf, the head of the EU Delegation to San Francisco, said that his office is working to build links with leading US researchers from universities like Stanford and Berkeley.