The European Commission published its Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a common framework for media services in the internal market (“EU Media Freedom Act“) and amending Directive 2010/13/EU (the revised Audiovisual Media Services Directive), and the Commission’s non-binding recommendation on internal safeguards for editorial independence and ownership transparency in the media sector (“Recommendation“).
The EU Media Freedom Act sets new rules to protect the media pluralism and media independence in the European information space through EU-wide minimum standards including, non-exhaustively, rights for both recipients of media services and media providers, and duties of media service providers, protection of editorial independence transparent state advertising, protection of media content online, and the framework for regulatory cooperation and enforcement in the media internal market. From the ashes of the European Regulators Group for Audiovisual Media (ERGA), the Proposal sets up a new independent European Board for Media Services comprising national media authorities, giving this Board new administrative and regulatory tasks and powers affecting the internal media market.
