AmCham Poland’s position paper on the draft bill on the protection of minors from access to harmful content on the Internet

The American Chamber of Commerce in Poland has prepared a position paper for the public consultation on the draft bill on the protection of minors from access to harmful content on the Internet. We are convinced that the draft law on the protection of minors from access to harmful content on the Internet, proposed by the Ministry of Digital Affairs, could be an important step towards a more effective fight against uncontrolled access to pornographic content by minors. At the same time, we draw attention to certain aspects of the proposed regulations that may lead to conflicts of the law with EU law or disproportionately reduce the level of legal certainty for entrepreneurs providing digital services.

In particular, our position paper highlights:

1. Legal risks associated with the law’s anticipated procedure for blocking access to websites
2. Risk of conflict with European Union law, particularly the Digital Services Act
3. Problems arising from the introduction of the vague and undefined term “harmful content” into the law.

The most important elements of our position were also raised during the public hearing of the project, which took place on March 12 at the headquarters of the Ministry of Digital Affairs. Our full position is available here.