STATEMENT: PDE Action Supports TERMS Act

In recent years, we’ve seen story after story of individuals and companies having their access to online services suddenly restricted for political reasons. When access to essential platforms for messaging, social media, or banking is revoked without notice, organizations are suddenly unable to perform essential functions to stay running and risk losing information stored in these platforms.  

Senator Ted Cruz’s Transparency in Enforcement, Restricting, and Monitoring of Services (TERMS) Act requires online services providers to publish clear acceptable use policies. Further, the TERMS Act requires that providers to give a user at least seven days advanced notice before restricting or revoking an account and explain how the user violated the acceptable use policy.  

The TERMS Act ensures that potential users can make a well-informed choice when selecting online service providers and holds those online service providers accountable in the even-handed enforcement of their acceptable use policies. 

You can read the full text of the bill here and the Senate Commerce press release here.  

“For too long, service providers have throttled, de-platformed, and censored organizations with politically disfavored viewpoints. The TERMS Act is aimed at increasing transparency and accountability for online service providers relative to their policies and account restrictions, and is a welcome development in the arena of consumer confidence and market competition. Consumers deserve to know whether the providers they select will one day terminate their contracts simply because of their disfavored ideologies. The TERMS Act will secure that kind of knowledge–good for the market, and good for consumers on the whole.” – Sarah Parshall Perry, Legal Director of PDE Action