As the COVID-19 pandemic rages and lethal lies spread, it's clear that disinformation is a public-health risk — and that Big Tech must be held accountable. In fact, in an unprecedented move, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory declaring that online misinformation is dangerous to our health.
Congress must take action now to rein in Big Tech's practice of profiting off of lies, or the dangers will only grow.
Sen. Edward Markey and Rep. Doris Matsui have introduced new legislation that would stop lethal disinformation from spreading on social media — and your representative and senators need to hear that you support this vital bill.
This legislation provides the long-overdue transparency and accountability that we need — and will expose the ways that powerful tech platforms extract our demographic and behavioral data. The bill would also help combat civil-rights harms by preventing the discriminatory use of personal information.
Tell your representative and senators in Congress to support the Markey-Matsui bill today.
I urge you to co-sponsor the Algorithmic Justice and Online Platform Transparency Act introduced by Sen. Markey and Rep. Matsui.
This legislation would require online platforms to annually disclose to users their content-moderation practices, and how they collect and use each user's personal information in their algorithmic processes. It would also make it illegal for platforms to process user data in a manner that segregates, discriminates or otherwise makes unavailable the goods, services, facilities, privileges or other advantages on the basis of an individual's race, ethnicity, gender identity, religious belief, sexual orientation, disability status or immigration status, among other categories.
This is a critical time to take action against the abuses of Big Tech. Thank you.
