What’s the process for handling malicious or abusive notices?

Questions & Answer

The DSA recognises that not all notices are genuine.

Platforms must implement systems to detect and manage abusive or malicious reporting, such as mass false takedown requests or bad-faith abuse claims.
Best practices include:
Logging the source and frequency of notices.
Flagging suspicious patterns (e.g. same user mass-reporting).
Applying rate limits or sanctions against abusive reporters.
Ensuring users targeted by false reports are not penalised unfairly.
The law protects against over-removal by requiring a balanced approach — reports must be checked against policies before action is taken.