Twitter, Google and Facebook bosses grilled in the U.S. Congress

The leaders of Twitter, Google and Facebook faced strong criticism from US Senators on Wednesday over the way content is moderated on their platforms, a sensitive issue less than a week before the US presidential election. 

Sundar Pichai, Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey delivered their opening remarks by videoconference to members of the Commerce Committee of the Upper House of Congress, defending in broad terms Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which prevents legal proceedings related to content published by third parties.

At the beginning of the hearing, Republican Senator Roger Wicker, who chairs the committee, called for a sweeping reform of the law to strengthen the accountability of technology giants.

"My concern is that these platforms have become powerful arbiters of truth and content that users can access," said the Senator from Mississippi, a southern U.S. state. 

"The American public is poorly informed about the decision-making process when content is moderated and users have little recourse when content is censored or restricted," he added.

Wicker focused his attacks on Twitter, which he accused of bias in its moderation of published messages, believing that Conservative officials, starting with Donald Trump, were excessively targeted.

"Your platform allows foreign dictators to publish their propaganda without restriction, while you systematically restrict the President of the United States," he castigated.

Dorsey, who appeared in the video with a particularly full beard, defended himself, ensuring that the network reacted as quickly as possible to moderate content deemed inappropriate in any way.

For his part, Google CEO Pichai described Section 230 as "a founding act of U.S. leadership in tech" and warned senators of the consequences of a transformation of the text for both businesses and individuals. 

Zuckerberg, who has had some problems logging on, opened the door to changes to Section 230.

"I think Congress should update the law to make sure it works the way it was intended," said the Facebook boss.