Break Up Big Tech Act of 2020

Break Up Big Tech Act of 2020

This bill removes immunity protections from a provider of an interactive computer service (e.g., a social media company) that engages in specified activities, such as selling and displaying personalized and contextual advertising without a user's consent.

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 8922 Introduced in House (IH)]

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116th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 8922

 To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to limit interactive computer 
                           service immunity.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            December 9, 2020

Ms. Gabbard (for herself and Mr. Gosar) introduced the following bill; 
       which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to limit interactive computer 
                           service immunity.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Break Up Big Tech Act of 2020''.

SEC. 2. LIMITATION ON INTERACTIVE COMPUTER SERVICE IMMUNITY.

    Section 230(c) of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 230(c)) 
is amended by adding at the end the following:
            ``(3) Limitation.--After the date of the enactment of this 
        paragraph, paragraphs (1) and (2) shall not apply to a provider 
        of an interactive computer service with respect to a service if 
        the provider after such date--
                    ``(A)(i) sells advertising in which an 
                advertisement is displayed to a user of such service 
                based on--
                            ``(I) personal traits of the user;
                            ``(II) previous location information with 
                        respect to the user;
                            ``(III) personal information from a profile 
                        about the user that is created for the purpose 
                        of selling advertisements;
                            ``(IV) the previous online or offline 
                        behavior of the user;
                            ``(V) the content of the website, online 
                        service, online application, or mobile 
                        application to which the user is connected;
                            ``(VI) the location of the user, as of the 
                        time at which the advertising is directed to 
                        the user; or
                            ``(VII) the search terms that the user 
                        applied to arrive at the website, service, or 
                        application to which the user is connected; and
                    ``(ii) displays an advertisement in a manner 
                described under clause (i) to a user who did not opt-in 
                to having an advertisement displayed to such user in 
                such a manner;
                    ``(B) through such service, places items, or 
                facilitates the placement of items, into the stream of 
                commerce;
                    ``(C) through such service, collects data for 
                commercial purposes other than receiving from users of 
                such service direct payment for the use of such 
                service; or
                    ``(D) uses a design or product that addicts, or 
                whose purpose is to addict, users to such service.
            ``(4) Exception.--
                    ``(A) In general.--Notwithstanding paragraph (1), 
                an owner or operator of a social media service that 
                displays user-generated content in an order other than 
                chronological order, delays the display of such content 
                relative to other content, or otherwise hinders the 
                display of such content relative to other content, if 
                for a reason other than to restrict access to or 
                availability of material described in paragraph (2)(A) 
                or to carry out the direction of the user that 
                generated or requested such content or generated or 
                requested restricted access to such content, shall be 
                treated as a publisher or speaker of such content.
                    ``(B) Definitions.--In this paragraph--
                            ``(i) Social media service.--The term 
                        `social media service' means any interactive 
                        computer service provided over the Internet 
                        that connects users for the purpose of such 
                        users engaging in dialogue, sharing 
                        information, collaborating, or otherwise 
                        interacting.
                            ``(ii) User-generated content.--The term 
                        `user-generated content' means content that is 
                        supplied on a social media service by an 
                        information content provider who is a user of 
                        such service.''.
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