News & Views

Today, the Commission launched 11 new European Partnerships together with industry, to boost investments in research and innovation and to overcome major climate and sustainability challenges, towards making Europe the first climate neutral economy and delivering on the European Green Deal. In line with the goals of the ‘twin' green and digital transition, the Partnerships will also deliver on the EU's digital ambitions for the next decade, Europe's Digital Decade.

The 2021 LUX Audience Film Award went to “Collective”, by Alexander Nanau. The winner of this year’s edition was announced on 9 June at the European Parliament’s plenary session in Strasbourg, where the LUX Audience Award Ceremony was held.

The Commission launched this week an infringement procedure against Hungary, following the Hungarian Media Council's decisions to reject Klubradio's application on the use of radio spectrum on highly questionable grounds.

Landmark EU rules on addressing the dissemination of terrorist content online entered into force this week. Platforms will have to remove terrorist content referred by Member States' authorities within 1 hour. The rules will also help to counter the spread of extremist ideologies online - a vital part of preventing attacks and addressing radicalisation.

On 7 June 2021, the European High Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU) world-class supercomputer MeluXina was officially inaugurated by His Royal Highness Henri, Grand Duke of Luxembourg, in Bissen, Luxembourg.

The Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (EU) 2019/790, for which the transposition deadline for Member State expires today, addresses among other things an issue that the cultural heritage sector has been struggling with for a long time: the exploitation of out-of-commerce works. Out-of-commerce works are works (e.g. visual arts, films, books, published or unpublished, etc.) that are still protected by copyright but that are not available via any commercial channels. European libraries, archives, museums and other cultural heritage institutions currently contain millions of out-of-commerce works in their collections. Such works can still hold great cultural, scientific, educational, historical and entertainment value. In order to support the core mission of cultural heritage institutions for public interest, the Directive establishes a clear framework for the digitisation and dissemination of such works.

This Monday 7 June marks the deadline for Member States to transpose the new EU copyright rules into national law. The new Copyright Directive protects creativity in the digital age, bringing concrete benefits to citizens, the creative sectors, the press, researchers, educators and cultural heritage institutions across the EU. At the same time, the new Directive on television and radio programmes will make it easier for European broadcasters to make certain programmes on their online services available across borders. Furthermore, today, the Commission has published its guidance on Article 17 of the new Copyright Directive, which provides for new rules on content-sharing platforms.

The Commission has proposed a framework for a European Digital Identity which will be available to all EU citizens, residents, and businesses in the EU. Citizens will be able to prove their identity and share electronic documents from their European Digital Identity wallets with the click of a button on their phone. They will be able to access online services with their national digital identification, which will be recognised throughout Europe. Very large platforms will be required to accept the use of European Digital Identity wallets upon request of the user, for example to prove their age. Use of the European Digital Identity wallet will always be at the choice of the user.

On 3 June, Digital SkillUp – a EU-co-funded initiative contributing to the Digital Skills and Jobs Platform – went live. It aims to make knowledge on emerging technologies available and accessible to all European citizens and businesses. Digital SkillUp provides easy-to-follow, engaging online courses in 10 European languages designed to help individuals, employees with a focus on SMEs employees, job seekers and organisations to up-skill and re-skill around emerging technologies and digital transformation.

The European Commission has launched an open public consultation on the announced Data Act aiming to create a fair data economy by ensuring access to and use of data. The consultation seeks to gather views from citizens, businesses, online platforms, academics, civil society, administrations and all interested parties. It is open until 3 September.