The new chief of the European Commission’s Digital agenda

The European Parliament elected on Tuesday German EPP Ursula von der Leyen as president of the European Commission. Despite the break in the traditional rules of the Spitzencandidate, she won 383 votes in a secret ballot, only a little above the absolute majority

The president candidate published its proposal for a policy agenda for the next five years. These proposals are in line with the recent DG Connect’s recommendation. She expesed many of its points during its speech in front of the European Parliament and did allude to did allude to ethics in artificial intelligence and cooperation in cybersecurity.

AI legislation in the first 100 days:

The elected President wants to put forward a text “for a coordinated European approach on the human and ethical implications of Artificial Intelligence”. This is not a new topic since the DG Connect’s expert group on AI had already published recommendations. She also wants to ensure the multiannual financial framework prioritizes investments in AI, which is also among the DG Connect’s recommendations.

Digital Services Act to upgrade our liability and safety rules

That idea directly comes from DG Connect that is working on the challenges raised by the platform economy. “A new Digital Services Act will upgrade our liability and safety rules for digital platforms, services and products,” von der Leyen wrote in her manifesto.

However it is not said whether a new proposal will be issued or the e-commerce directive will be recasted.  The “liability” word is huge of consequences, the European Commission (DG Grow) is assessing wheater the 1985 Product Liability directive will be reviewed.

Platforms “to protect democracy”

Von der Leyen wants a regulatory proposal on transparency for paid political advertising online and also mentions fake news and hate speech. “We should develop a joint approach and common standards to tackle issues such as disinformation and online hate messages,” she wrote.

Data sharing

Like DG Connect, Von der Leyen mentions the need to find a balance between using data and ensuring security and privacy. However, she doesn’t go as far as the DG Connect and don’t propose any piece of legislation for data sharing in the private sector.

Digital sovereignty

Following the path of DG Connect and ENISA on “digital strategic autonomy” and “digital sovereignty” recommendations, von der Leyen devotes part of her digital strategy to “technological sovereignty,” specifically in “blockchain, high-performance computing, quantum computing, algorithms.”

When it comes to standards, she advocates for “jointly define standards … that will become the global norm.” Hence, she follows the last EU council conclusions from June that called on EU institutions to strengthen digital sovereignty.

Cyber fighting through a joint Cyber Unit

According to the President, the EU “needs to move from ‘need to know’ to ‘need to share’” in terms of intelligence sharing, she suggests to “do this through a joint Cyber Unit.” However, she doesn’t mention DG Connect’s legislative options for cybersecurity requirements.