Polish publishers condemn Facebook after it limits post visibility following change to copyright law

Facebook has caused anger among Polish media outlets by removing images and text from their articles when they are posted on the social media platform.

The US firm claims it has done so due to legal doubts over Poland’s implementation of an EU copyright directive. But a Polish publishers’ association accuses the social media giant of “exploiting its dominant position” to “censor” content.

As of Friday, when links to Polish media outlets are posted on Facebook, only their title appears, without the image and text summary that was previously also visible.

In a statement, Facebook said that it had done this because a new Polish copyright law, which went into force on Friday, is “not consistent with the scope or terms” of the European Union copyright directive that it is supposed to implement.

In particular, it says that Poland’s law has “created a lack of clarity” around article 15 of the EU directive, which relates to so-called neighbouring rights (also known as related rights) for those associated with a creative work but who are not its actual creators.

Facebook did not say what specific legal concerns it has. It added, however, that its decision is an “interim approach pending guidance on the scope of Article 15 from the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in relation to a similar implementing law in Italy”.

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The social media giant’s decision has been condemned by prominent voices in Poland’s media industry, who note that the way articles now appear on Facebook makes them much less noticeable and attractive to users.

“Facebook has gone to war with the Polish media,” Bartosz Węglarczyk, the editor-in-chief of Onet, a leading news website, wrote in a Facebook post. “We are being punished for changes in the copyright law that Big Tech doesn’t like.”

Poland’s implementation of the EU’s copyright directive has provoked controversy. In July this year, hundreds of media outlets jointly protested against the proposed legislation, arguing that it favoured tech giants and threatened Polish businesses.

That eventually led parliament to amend the legislation, introducing a mechanism that would allow media firms to seek help from a state agency when negotiating with tech giants such as Google and Facebook over payments for their content.

Over 350 Polish media outlets are jointly protesting today against a proposed copyright law – implementing an EU directive – that they say would benefit tech giants who can „use our content free of charge and with impunity, and transfer the profits abroad” https://t.co/hJQ77dIaZZ

— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) July 4, 2024

In a statement published on Friday, however, Poland’s Chamber of Press Publishers (IWP) argued that Poland’s implementation of article 15 “does not differ substantially from the solutions adopted in several other European countries”.

It accused Meta – the group that owns Facebook as well as Instagram and WhatsApp – of “becoming a censor of content and exploiting its dominant position”. The company’s actions “will have negative consequences for the entire sector”, warned the IWP.

“This may constitute grounds for publishers to take appropriate legal action,” they added.

The Senate has amended a proposed copyright law following protests from media outlets, which claimed that the bill in its previous form favoured Big Tech firms and threatened some publishers with bankruptcy https://t.co/8PevZnBXYE

— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) July 25, 2024

Agata Pyka is an assistant editor at Notes from Poland. She is a journalist and a political communication student at the University of Amsterdam. She specialises in Polish and European politics as well as investigative journalism and has previously written for Euractiv and The European Correspondent.