EU urged to cover platform monetisation in Digital Fairness Act
Fifteen organisations say the DFA must cover subscriptions, bonuses, and platform funding programmes.
A coalition of civil society organisations, academics, and advocates has published an open letter urging the European Commission to ensure that forthcoming Digital Fairness Act rules on influencer marketing extend beyond third-party advertising payments to include income generated through platform monetisation services.
The signatories welcome the Commission’s proposal to require influencers to disclose payments received for their content but argue that it leaves a significant transparency gap. They note that social media platforms increasingly provide creators with monetisation tools such as subscriptions, donations, affiliate marketing, branded partnerships and platform-funded bonus programmes, many of which would fall outside rules focused solely on third-party advertising payments.
The letter proposes minimum transparency measures including labels identifying content that benefits from platform monetisation, account-level labels showing participation in monetisation programmes, public monetisation libraries to support independent oversight, and disclosures explaining platforms’ monetisation policies, moderation practices and enforcement.
The coalition, whose members include AlgorithmWatch, Bits of Freedom, Corporate Europe Observatory, and the Digital Rights Foundation, together with academic experts including an associate professor from Finland’s Hanken School of Economics, has invited the Commission to discuss ways of incorporating these proposals into the Digital Fairness Act before it is finalised.
Why does it matter?
The debate reflects a broader shift in how online influence is financed. Increasingly, creators earn income not only from advertisers but also through platform-designed monetisation systems that reward engagement, subscriptions and other forms of user activity. Without transparency around these incentives, audiences may struggle to distinguish between organic content and content shaped by commercial rewards built into platform design.
The Digital Fairness Act, therefore, presents an opportunity to broaden consumer protection beyond traditional advertising disclosure. Extending transparency requirements to platform monetisation could improve accountability for creators and platforms alike while giving regulators, researchers and users greater visibility into the financial incentives shaping online content.
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