in February 2020 that it had banned sales of more than a million products on its platform that promised to cure or protect people from the coronavirus.
Although European lawmakers have reached a political agreement on the digital services act, the regulation’s language and technical details have yet to be finalized, and there is still uncertainty about what powers the Commission will have over tech platforms in times of crisis. Wikipedia was also concerned that the crisis mechanism would force the platform to interfere with content decisions that are usually made by the website’s community, according to Jan Gerlach, public policy director at Wikimedia, Wikipedia’s nonprofit parent organization.
“All measures under the crisis mechanism will be limited in time and accompanied by safeguards for fundamental rights,” says Johannes Bahrke, the European Commission’s coordinating spokesperson for digital economy research and innovation, adding that the Commission will only be able to extend the three-month period upon recommendation by the board, and any use of the crisis mechanism will be made public.