Implementation of the European Digital Services Regulation (DSR/DSA): Adoption of the delegated act on researchers' access to data

The European Digital Services Regulation (DSA) aims to promote a safer Internet within the European Union. Article 40 of this regulation makes provision for an innovative mechanism enabling researchers to access data from very large online platforms, once they have been approved for this purpose by the relevant Digital Services Coordinator (DSC).

The European Commission today adopted a delegated act specifying how very large online platforms will henceforth share their data with approved researchers, enabling the latter to play a major role in analyzing the impact of these platforms on their users and on European democracies, for example by highlighting and analyzing the effects of amplification or prescription of certain content or trends by algorithms.

These new rules will be effective from three months. From then on, the first approved researchers will be able to submit their requests for access to their data to the platforms. To help them in their endeavors, researchers will benefit from an online portal through which to communicate with CSNs, national authorities and online platforms.

Arcom welcomes the publication of this delegated act. After having coordinated, within the Digital Services Committee, the preparatory work of the CSNs for the efficient and coherent implementation of the researcher approval scheme on a European scale, it intends to work towards the full appropriation of this new mechanism by researchers.

To this end, on July 3, the regulator is organizing a workshop to present the scheme to interested researchers, and to inform them of the conditions for approval, so as to enable them to prepare as well as possible for the scheme's entry into force.

The European Commission's press release

The delegated act