The US State Department is developing an online portal, freedom.gov, that will allow users in Europe and other regions to access content blocked by local authorities, including alleged “hate speech and terrorist propaganda“, Reuters reported, citing three sources familiar with the plan.
According to the sources, Washington sees the project as a tool to combat censorship, while some lawyers and State Department officials have already expressed concerns about its legal and political implications, including the risk of further escalating tensions with European allies over their regulation of online content.
The website is expected to run at freedom.gov and discussions are underway about the possibility of a built-in VPN feature that would disguise traffic as US traffic. The report states that user activity will not be tracked. However, it is not yet clear what benefits the US government portal will offer to users who are not accessible through standard VPNs.
In its National Security Strategy, published last December, the Trump administration warned that Europe was facing a “civilizational collapse“ due to its migration policies. It said the US would prioritize “strengthening resistance in European countries to Europe's current trajectory“.
The report states that EU regulators routinely require US-based websites to remove content and can impose bans as a last resort. Last year, for example, the European Commission fined Platform X €120 million for violating the Digital Services Act.