On 8 April 2021, the Polish government published its position on a bill concerning the Digital Services Act (DSA). The changes proposed by the government include:

  • strengthening the powers of the national digital services coordinator,
  • making implementation of the DSA subject to the jurisdiction of the national regulator as broadly as possible, within the limits of EU law.
  • content management by large online platforms that takes into account as much as possible the socio-cultural context of the user’s country. Therefore, the Polish government will be advocating that the national regulator has competence to approve the service regulations of a large online platform.
  • a requirement to publish terms of service in an understandable, legible and user-friendly manner. Large platforms should publish terms and conditions for their services in the official languages of the EU countries to which they direct their services, and ensure that users can communicate with the service provider in the official language or languages of the countries where they live.
  • with regard to jurisdiction, the Polish government is demanding that the user have the right to a fast-track judicial procedure, i.e. appeal against a decision of the platform directly to the national court or specialized body of the country where they reside or have their habitual residence,
  • online platforms must provide a transparent, flexible and user-friendly appeal path against decisions to block content. The user should know whether a decision on a post was made by a human or an algorithm. They should have the right to request that their case be reviewed by a human being.
  • the Polish government will seek to structure the obligations of Internet service providers with respect to illegal content relating to criminal activity in such a way that, in addition to the need to remove illegal content, they will also include the need to provide law enforcement agencies, free of charge, with the necessary data to identify the end users responsible for posting the content.