NY Proposes Mandated Open Access To Social Media APIs

Given just how many terrible state social media laws we keep seeing, it’s nice to finally see one that, conceptually, I agree with, though practically still worry about.

NY state senator Brad Holyman-Sigal has introduced a bill to require social media websites to provide an openly accessible API for others to build on top of. Senate Bill S6686 is definitely the kind of bill that fits with my belief that the world is better when we’re focused on protocols instead of platforms, and that platforms aren’t able to lock-in users and prevent others from building better services on top of the platforms.

So, conceptually, I like the basic idea in the bill, as described by a recent Bloomberg article about it.

New York would require social media platforms to provide free data to apps that allow users to block hateful speech under legislation state lawmakers are expected to consider next year.

Of course, every time this idea comes up, some people worry about potentially bad actors making use of the APIs. In short, the Cambridge Analytica scenario. But the law allows for blocking that access in those cases. The exceptions include:

A social media platform may deny or discontinue any user or authorized representative’s application’s access to the API if:

(a) The social media platform reasonably determines, consistent with access requirements clearly established in its terms and conditions, that allowing a user or authorized representative to connect or remain connected to the API would present an unacceptable level of risk to the security of the social media platform or its users; and

(b) The social media platform makes this determination using objective, verifiable criteria that are applied fairly and consistently across all applications and developers through which users may seek access to the platform; provided that the social media platform must retain records of any decision to restrict API access to any users or authorized representative, including the user, date, time, documented misuses and record of notification of violation.

There’s more in the bill, and it would certainly help companies like Block Party (which we’ve spoken about a few times here on Techdirt) build better tools to help users take more control over their own user experience, rather than relying on the underlying platform. As Bloomberg notes:

Block Party and similar apps allow users to use a variety of criteria to block hate-filled posts, notifications, comments, and other activity before they would have viewed it in their social media feeds.

Such software has thwarted millions of troll comments since Chou founded Block Party in 2021 after becoming the target of online harassment.

At the time, she struck a deal with Twitter to get free access. She said it was a win-win situation that allowed the platform to address harassment without devoting its own financial resources.

“You need third parties who are motivated,” said Chou. “Platforms are just not incentivized to build out that full suite of solutions for end users to control their experience.”

The bill—which would take effect 180 days after getting signed into law—would restore power to people who want to control what messages reach them on social media while leaving others free to say what they want online, according to Chou.

“Really what you’re doing is just giving people more control over what they’re seeing, not curtailing anybody’s ability to speak,” said Chou. “Freedom of speech is not the same thing as freedom of reach.”

In effect this would roll back some aspects of companies like ExTwitter and Reddit trying to restrict access to their APIs and putting up ridiculously expensive paywalls for that access. It would be tearing down walls and enabling more innovation.

That’s… the good side. I’m still not totally convinced this is a good bill, however. My first concern is simply that it’s a state bill. We keep noting that states have little to no authority to regulate social media, which is often run out of state, and the dormant commerce clause issues here are real, even if the intent of the bill is good.

Second, it’s not clear to me that there’s any limiting elements on who this applies to beyond “social media platforms” that do a few things that most social media platforms do. And that raises some concerns about smaller, more directed and targeted sites, which might not really be set up to provide such an API, but under this law might need to do so.

So, I like the concept of the bill, but I’m just not sure New York really has the authority to do this like this, and I worry on the margins about some of the way the bill is written.

Still, it’s way, way better than nearly all the other state bills I see these days about social media.