President Karol Nawrocki on Friday vetoed the government’s bill implementing the EU Digital Services Act (DSA). The legislation was meant to enable the blocking of illegal online content, including content containing hate speech.

The amendment to the law on providing services by electronic means and certain other laws was prepared by the Ministry of Digital Affairs. The changes were intended to introduce a procedure allowing orders restricting access to unlawful online content to be issued quickly, while respecting the rights of internet users.

President Karol Nawrocki announced the veto on his website and on X.

– I will not give in to any blackmail by those in power, all the more so when security and freedom are meant to be the hostages. That is an immoral and unacceptable way to act. The state today has a wide range of options for protecting citizens from criminals. It only needs the will, the strength and the skill to use them effectively, Nawrocki said in explaining his decision.

He added that if stronger regulations are needed, the government should prepare appropriate proposals. The current ones, he said, are not an improvement in security but “an attempt to abuse power in order to protect its own political interests.”

The president noted that the bill “under normal conditions could have been referred to the Constitutional Tribunal for review.” – But today there is no Tribunal. It first has to be rebuilt. So a veto was the only option, he added.

According to the president, the proposed provisions “give the government essentially arbitrary controls and the ability to decide what we can and cannot say, write or publish.”

He said his first veto of a bill on this issue produced a result: the regulations on organizing the national system for applying the DSA were separated from the provisions establishing a procedure for blocking illegal content.

The president recalled that at the final stage of work in the Senate, officials’ powers to block content were expanded again. He said the government had used a series of attacks in schools for that purpose.

Nawrocki stressed that the state already has tools to fight terrorist content.

– The case of the October tragedy showed that the services, if they want to, are able to make effective use of existing legal instruments and do not need any additional statutory changes to do so, the president said.

He added that “under the banner of security, a mechanism is being created that gives public administration bodies, the government, the power to issue decisions blocking specific content on the internet.”

He argued that this is a particularly sensitive power and that its abuse could lead to a restriction of public debate.

“Protecting children from online criminals. It is hard to imagine a more important issue, one that should unite people across political divides. And yet he vetoed it,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk wrote on X.

– I thought the president could no longer surprise me with anything when it comes to vetoes, but yes, I am nevertheless very surprised by this, Tusk said when asked about the veto at a briefing before returning from Dublin.

In the prime minister’s view, “especially” in the context of events in recent months, protecting young people from “evil on the internet, from hatred, from aggression, from criminals online” seemed to him “so obvious.”

– I am unable to comprehend why the president is ready to block even such needed and socially justified laws. It is a disgrace, really. If he wants to wage war on the government at the expense of Polish children and Poland’s security, then that is simply a disgrace, Tusk said.

Asked whether another attempt would be made to introduce the vetoed provisions, he replied that he himself “does not want to engage in fruitless disputes” but “will try to persuade.”

– But you know yourselves what can be done here next? Such an obvious matter surely does not need to be explained to anyone, he told reporters. He added that it seems to him the president’s decision is “just a blind political reluctance, a desire to block and obstruct.”

Deputy Prime Minister and Digital Affairs Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski wrote on X that “the president’s veto of the so-called digital bill is a green light for hate, hatred and the death that the internet brings.” “The president takes personal responsibility for all of it,” Gawkowski wrote.

Deputy Digital Affairs Minister Dariusz Standerski called the president’s veto “outrageous.” “For the second time, the president has blocked a law meant to protect Poles from the most dangerous crimes on the internet. Encouraging suicide. Contract killings. Materials that harm children. These are not opinions or ‘controversial content.’ These are crimes,” Standerski wrote on X.

“Freedom of speech does not give anyone the right to harm people with impunity. It is not a license to threaten, deceive, incite hatred or sexually exploit children. Calling protection against such crimes censorship is a cynical abuse of the concept of freedom,” Justice Minister Waldemar Żurek wrote on X.

He noted that today, in particular, it is clear how easily the internet becomes a tool for manipulation and for stoking social conflict. “Recent events in Kraków showed how quickly false information and bots can poison public debate,” Żurek wrote.

He said that NASK, a Polish research and cybersecurity institute, had reported nearly 4,800 disinformation items to social media platforms in just four days. “Within the first day alone, more than 2,000 accounts spreading false narratives were identified. Among them were bots, and several dozen profiles used the Russian language or contained references to Russia,” he said.

“After all, we know perfectly well who benefits from this. For years, Russian propaganda has been trying to divide Poles, pit them against one another, and undermine trust in the state and its institutions. Lies, disinformation and polarization are tools used to weaken Poland. That is why I ask directly: whose interests are you defending by once again blocking provisions meant to protect citizens? Because it is hard to find any benefit in this decision for the victims of internet crimes,” the justice minister wrote.

In his view, one cannot hide behind freedom endlessly while denying the state the tools to protect people from criminals. “This is not responsible concern for civil rights. Once again I am ashamed of your actions, Mr. Nawrocki,” he said.

“Still on the side of corporations, under the cover of ‘freedom,’ President Nawrocki vetoes a law supporting online safety. A blow against Poland, a blow against the safety of Poles. Children as well,” Education Minister Barbara Nowacka wrote on X.

“The veto of the DSA provisions is a gift to fraudsters and human traffickers, and the bill is being paid by Polish children and retirees robbed of their savings by deepfakes, including ones starring Karol Nawrocki,” government spokesman Adam Szłapka wrote. “Karol Nawrocki, the great defender of sovereignty, who by vetoing the DSA bill handed control of the Polish internet to Meta and TikTok,” he added.

At a press conference, Deputy Prime Minister Gawkowski said the president “can veto a bill, but he has not vetoed the problem.”

– I am bringing a public indictment against the president: he takes personal responsibility for every harmed child. For all the tears of mothers who will weep over children harmed on the internet, Gawkowski said.

He added that “this is a dispute over whether the state can be effective and will have the tools to fight pathostreaming on the internet.”

Gawkowski noted that there are currently no tools for blocking pathological content online. – The only tools that exist today in Poland for blocking content belong to the Internal Security Agency and concern terrorist activity, he added.

He stressed that he knows why the president vetoed the bill. – The right does not want this law because it is damn afraid that it would put an end once and for all to the promotion of pathological content on the internet, which also helps build the right. This law would have given a chance for a clean internet without all the bad things that affect children and older people today. Without hate, hatred and calls for violence, he added.

He said the president had behaved like “a lobbyist for internet platforms, who says: keep making money, and I will be happy, because I am promoting the right.”

He also recalled that the president’s wife will soon host a round table against hate speech and hate online. – I am curious what she will say to everyone who comes. The tools that could have limited hate, hatred and pathostreams were on the table. And the president vetoed them, he stressed.

He announced a new online safety bill. – It certainly will not be the case that anyone gives up after this veto. We do not intend to let it go. We will prepare another bill that will provide safety on the internet, the digital affairs minister said.

Deputy Minister Standerski, for his part, said that responsibility comes with every decision. – This is not a game. This is not politics about who shows whom up more. This is real life. Real life, in which money is at stake, often a lifetime of savings. Real life, in which the mental health of young people is at stake, their health, and sometimes, unfortunately, their lives, he added.

– Of course we will take action and we will return with these provisions. The problem is that even when returning with new provisions, you have to have someone on the other side who has at least a basic sense of responsibility for their decisions, Standerski noted. – I have the impression that today in the Presidential Palace there is no one who has a basic sense of responsibility for what they do, he added.

The vetoed bill was one of two amendments to the law on providing services by electronic means and certain other laws that were prepared in response to the president’s veto earlier this year. The other, which allows the president of the Office of Electronic Communications (UKE) to be appointed as digital services coordinator, was signed by President Karol Nawrocki at the end of September and took effect on Nov. 6.

Adopting the regulations is necessary to implement in Poland the Digital Services Act (DSA), which has applied in European Union countries for more than two years. Failure to implement it carries the risk of heavy financial penalties from the Court of Justice of the EU.

Under the vetoed amendment, courts and competent authorities were to issue orders concerning online content. These would apply when unlawful content appeared online, for example content related to internet fraud, identity theft, human trafficking, the promotion of totalitarian regimes, the sale of counterfeits and illegal trade in goods.

Internet service providers, including online platforms, would have had to block content identified in the authorities’ decisions, but users whose content was restricted could have applied to have access restored if it was blocked in error. Before filing a request with the authority, they would have had to use the provider’s content reporting system.

The president of the Office of Electronic Communications was to maintain a register of websites used to disseminate illegal content.

Decisions ordering restricted access to illegal content could have been appealed to a common court, which would check whether the content actually violates the law. For that reason, the orders would not have been carried out automatically before they could be challenged in court.

In particularly urgent cases, the authorities’ decisions were to be given immediate enforceability. Prosecutors, the Police, the National Revenue Administration and the Border Guard could have requested the quick blocking of unlawful content, including content related to the sexual exploitation of children.

The Digital Services Act (DSA) is the world’s first digital regulation (an EU regulation) that makes companies across the EU responsible for content posted on their platforms. It has applied in full in member states since Feb. 17, 2024. Articles 9 and 10 of the DSA state that national judicial and administrative authorities may order providers to block content on the internet. (PAP)