The vice president of the European Association for Digital Transition, Ana Caballero, was recently interviewed on the video blog La España que reúne, a civil society group that defends consensus around the major values in the Spanish Constitution of 1978. In her comments, Caballero spoke about the principles that drive the European Association for Digital Transition, with a special section dedicated to the latest Facebook’s scandals.
We refer specifically to the testimony by Frances Haugen, a former Facebook employee, who denounced the platform’s bad practices before the United States Senate in October, accusing it of hiding vital information for both users and the authorities. “The company’s leaders know how to make Facebook and Instagram [owned by the former] safer, but they won’t make the necessary changes because they put their astronomical profits ahead of people”, denounced Haugen, who claimed that the company has its own studies on the damage its platform has on minors.
For Caballero, a lawyer and spokesperson for the EADT, “We need awareness, so it’s good for Facebook’s scandals to be known and made public”. This social awareness is the first step toward a change in our relationship with the big tech companies. And it must be accompanied by regulation, such as that being implemented by the EU to put an end to the opacity of these platforms, which are so powerful they seemingly escape state control.
This pedagogical work is especially important in the case of minors, whose data is already being used by platforms like Google Classroom, remarked Caballero. “Minors have to understand their digital rights, because if they don’t understand them they won’t be able to put them into practice”, she emphasized.
For an orderly Digital Transition
As Caballero reiterated in her comments, the EADT works for an orderly and inclusive Digital Transition, as opposed to the disarray of a current model that produces, with the dominance of large U.S. and Chinese platforms, all types of imbalances. It is about building an alternative model based on European values that prevents tax evasion, respects data privacy, and creates innovation and jobs.
In order to combat this drifting, which ultimately threatens the sovereignty of European countries, the EADT defends a strong EU capable of making a digital transition in line with its values.
