U.S President Joe Biden has revoked an executive order signed by his predecessor President Trump which ordered regulators to limit liability protection for social media companies. The White House revoked these orders which had been issued to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Following this revocation, the Center for Democracy and Technology hailed President Biden for the revocation terming Trump’s decision as one which ‘was an attempt to use threats of retaliation to coerce social media companies into allowing disinformation and hateful speech to go unchecked’.
President Trump issued the executive order on May 2020, the Center for Democracy and Technology had made a court filing to block the move.
Former President Trump, was ordering the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to make new regulations to limit protection for social media companies under the 1996 Communications Decency Act.
This act protects the social networks companies from taking liability of any content posted across their platforms by its users. It further allows the social media companies to lawfully take down such materials down.
Notable legal experts argued that the FCC has no legal authority to issue regulations under the 1996 Communications Decency Act which means that FCC had no authority to carry out what Trump was asking.
