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The US Supreme Court has upheld an important rule protecting online services from liability for user posts. In two cases, judges dismissed plaintiffs who wanted Twitter and Google responsible for the dissemination of terrorist content. This reinforces the protective shield against lawsuits known as “Section 230” under which the major online platforms were able to develop.

The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that Twitter cannot be held liable for terrorist content on the platform under US anti-terrorism law. The relatives of a man who died in 2017 in an attack by the terrorist militia Islamic State (IS) in Istanbul had filed a report.

They accused online platforms of supporting terrorists by spreading their messages. The justices of the US Supreme Court disagreed. With regard to the Twitter verdict, they have not dealt with a second case involving similar allegations against Google’s video platform YouTube.

An important detail for the industry is that the judges also did not see the work of general recommendation algorithms that select posts for users as actively contributing to the distribution of specific videos, unlike the plaintiffs.

In a court hearing, the question of whether algorithms fall under the protective umbrella of ‘article 230’ was debated, among other things. US law from the 1990s protects online services from liability for the publication of content created by others. (sda/dpa)