Addictive design legislation for Big Tech has legs in next parliament, MEPs say

The push for legislation to curb addictive design in Big Tech platforms will likely continue in the next mandate, after June’s EU elections, two MEPs behind the initiative told Euractiv. 

A file on consumer protection in the digital age, which includes this issue, might be one of the few on tech initiated in the next mandate, following a spree of digital policy legislation in the last five years.

The European Parliament adopted a resolution in  December 2023 calling on the Commission to look into addictive design legislation with a landslide majority of 545 votes in favour. This shows that there is a “huge appetite”, said centrist Stephanie Yon-Courtin (Renew, France), the resolution’s shadow rapporteur.

More recently, the Commission is seriously considering the inclusion of a “right to not be disturbed” in their digital fairness check, as well as the right to buy apps and smartphones without addictive features, said MEP Kim van Sparrentak (Greens, Netherlands). She was the rapporteur  for the resolution, which also called for such a “right not to be disurbed.”

The digital fairness check is an evaluation of existing consumer protection law to see if it needs to be updated for tech. It is expected to conlude in Q2 2024. Consumer rights are currently mostly “offine” and not “digital-based” said the Greens MEP.

Van Sparrentak is expected to make it into the next Parliament, but Yon-Courtin’s seat is not looking promising, based on the latest projections.

Existing tech regulation, including the Artificial Intelligence and Digital Services Acts, do not sufficiently address addiction to digital platforms, a phenomenon particularly troublesome with regards to minors, the resolution said. The Parliament called on the Commission to figure out what further policy initiatives on digital addiction are necessary.

The resolution mentioned in particular features like endless scrolling and auto-play, and brought up a need to “empower consumers by turning all attention-seeking features off by design” and let them have a choice when to activate them.

“Empirical research facilitated by the [Digital Service Act’s] DSA’s data access provisions” will likely give further insights into addictive design, based on which new legislation might be considered, said Mathias Vermeulen, public policy director at AWO Agency.

The resolution faced little pushback from industry, Yon-Courtin said. “I think that people behind the companies are parents, and they do feel the danger when it comes to these products for children,” she said.

But the Greens MEP said Big Tech at first said such rules would be “nonsense” since they are already doing all they can. Later, they started pushing back, she said.

“I cannot imagine they’re not right now on top of the European Commission trying to make sure that all they have to do is sign of code of conduct,” she said.

A more extreme-right parliament, which looks increasingly likely, according to projections, could “change the situation” in which there is currently broad agreement on the need to regulate addictive design, said Yon-Courtin.

Addictive design is right at the intersection of the DSA, the General Data Protection Regulation, and the consumer law framework, said AWO’s Vermeulen. He continued to question the value of rolling out new addictive design legislation, given that the EU still “hasn’t fully utilised the new tools available to counter this phenomenon”.

But van Sparrentak said that consumer protection law is more “prescriptive” than other tech legislation, making sure products do not pose addiction risk before they are on the market.

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[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic]

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