EU Strengthens Regulation of Public Channels: The Battle Over Digital Sovereignty and Platform Accountability Boundaries.
29/01/2026
On January 26, Brussels, the European Commission officially included Meta's instant messaging app WhatsApp in the regulatory list of the Digital Services Act, designating its channel feature as a Very Large Online Platform. This decision is based on a key statistic: in the first half of 2025, WhatsApp Channels averaged 51.7 million monthly active users across the 27 EU member states, far exceeding the DSA's threshold of 45 million users. From this moment, Meta has four months, until mid-May 2026, to ensure that WhatsApp's public channel feature complies with stricter obligations, including systematic risk assessments, combating illegal content, and preventing election manipulation. This does not target end-to-end encrypted private chats but rather the channel feature that allows news agencies, football clubs, or influencers to broadcast information to a wide audience. Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President for Digital Policy, clearly outlined this regulatory red line during the announcement. For WhatsApp, which boasts over 2 billion monthly active users, this move by the EU marks the world's strictest digital regulatory framework beginning to penetrate the core of instant messaging services.
How the Regulatory Sword Accurately Falls: From the "Channel" Function to Systemic Risk
The European Commission's move this time reflects a highly precise regulatory logic based on functional categorization. The target of DSA regulation is not WhatsApp as a whole, but rather a specific feature within it that possesses the nature of public broadcasting. This stands in stark contrast to WhatsApp's core—the end-to-end encrypted private communication service—which is explicitly excluded from the scope of the DSA. This distinction is crucial, as it addresses the core concerns regarding the infringement of communication privacy. Regulators in Brussels are well aware that touching encrypted private messaging is both a political and technical minefield. However, they assert that when a feature has over 51.7 million users in the EU and enables one-to-many mass information dissemination, its nature fundamentally changes—from a private communication tool to a public platform with significant societal influence.
According to the DSA's requirements for very large online platforms, WhatsApp channels must now fulfill a series of heavy obligations. This includes conducting an in-depth systemic risk assessment annually, evaluating how their services might be used to infringe fundamental human rights, suppress freedom of expression, manipulate election processes, disseminate illegal content, and raise privacy concerns. Following the assessment, the platform must implement corresponding risk mitigation measures. For instance, more efficient and transparent mechanisms for reporting and handling illegal content need to be established. Here, illegal content is clearly defined within the EU, including death threats, hate speech, Nazi symbols, etc., which are prohibited both online and offline. Additionally, platforms must provide EU regulatory authorities with data access, enabling independent researchers to study systemic risks on the platform. In October last year, the EU accused Meta's Facebook and Instagram of failing to provide sufficient public data access to researchers.
For Meta, compliance costs will rise sharply. Scanning, evaluating, and monitoring massive amounts of public channel content requires significant technological and human resources. This is not simply about setting up a few keyword filters; the DSA demands a continuously evolving governance system built on a deep understanding of systemic risks. The response from WhatsApp's spokesperson—"We are committed to developing safety and integrity measures in the region to ensure they meet relevant regulatory expectations"—sounds like a standard corporate statement, but behind it lies the immense, time-sensitive work about to begin for countless engineers, legal, and compliance personnel. The four-month grace period may seem long, but it is quite tight for modifying the specific functional architecture of a global platform.
The Regulatory Chessboard in Brussels: Comprehensive Pressure from Start to Finish
Including WhatsApp in the VLOP list is not an isolated action, but rather the latest step in a series of regulatory offensives launched by the European Union in recent years against large digital platforms. Currently, there are 26 names on the VLOP list directly supervised by Brussels, including Amazon, Shein, Zalando, X, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and now WhatsApp. This list itself serves as a power map of the global digital economy, and the EU is striving to become the most important rule-maker for this map.
On the same day as the action against WhatsApp, the European Commission announced a new investigation into the AI tool Grok on Elon Musk's X platform, focusing on the risk of its generative pornographic deepfake images. This comes just one month after the EU issued its first fine against X under the DSA—in December 2025, X was fined 120 million euros for violating transparency rules. For Meta, the EU is waging a multi-front battle. In addition to the recent action targeting WhatsApp channels, another antitrust investigation into WhatsApp's AI features was launched in December 2024. Brussels is examining whether Meta has excluded other competitors while promoting its AI tools, thereby violating EU competition rules.
Meanwhile, Meta's other two pillars, Facebook and Instagram, have long been under the dual pressure of the DSA and the Digital Markets Act. In October 2025, the European Union accused these two platforms of inadequacies in providing data access to researchers and establishing user-friendly mechanisms for reporting illegal content. Brussels is also investigating whether they have failed to take sufficient measures to curb the platforms' addictive impact on children. At the level of competition law, the EU has already fined Meta 200 million euros under the DMA for abusing its dominant market position in its advertising business, and Meta is currently appealing this decision.
This series of actions outlines a clear framework for the EU's digital strategy: regulating content and systemic risks through the DSA, and curbing market monopolistic behavior through the DMA. The regulatory focus is highly concentrated on U.S. tech giants, inevitably sparking transatlantic friction. Despite facing strong opposition and threats of retaliation from the United States, the EU's regulatory pace has not slowed. From a strategic perspective, this is not merely about consumer protection or market regulation; it is a grand attempt by the EU to pursue digital sovereignty and reshape the global internet governance landscape at the rule-making level. Brussels is using regulations and fines to chart a European path for the digital era, distinct from Silicon Valley's laissez-faire approach.
The Battlefield Beyond the Encryption Moat: The Blurred Line Between Public Broadcasting and Private Communication
The core contradiction of the EU's regulation this time lies in the increasingly blurred boundary between the public and private spheres in the digital age. WhatsApp is essentially a hybrid: its foundation is end-to-end encrypted private communication, which is regarded as a fortress of privacy rights in the digital era; however, the channel feature built upon it is an out-and-out public broadcasting system. The EU's regulatory logic is that as long as this encrypted moat remains strong, the sanctity of private communication should be absolutely respected. Yet, the public square beyond the moat—namely, the channels—must adhere to the same public governance standards as platforms like Facebook and X.
This distinction is clear in theory but may face challenges in practice. First, risks can flow across boundaries. Illegal activities planned in private groups may be promoted and recruited through public channels; false information spread in public channels may be discussed and deepened in encrypted chats. How can platforms assess and mitigate this cross-functional risk transmission without intruding into private conversations? This requires extremely sophisticated governance design. Second, the boundaries of user behavior are inherently blurred. An individual with significant influence may have a public channel, yet their one-on-one interactions with subscribers fall under private communication. When the same person uses both functions in a coordinated manner (for example, posting suggestive information through the channel and then completing specific actions via private chats), regulatory blind spots emerge.
The deeper reason is that the EU's regulation of very large platforms fundamentally reflects vigilance against a new form of power. When any communication tool gathers over 45 million users (approximately 10% of the EU population) for public information consumption, it gains substantial power to shape public agendas and influence social sentiment. Such power cannot evade accountability simply because it is attached to an encrypted communication tool. European Commission Vice-President Virkkunen emphasized that private messaging services remain excluded from the DSA, which serves both as a legal clarification and a political reassurance aimed at quelling potential fears of comprehensive surveillance. However, the expansive nature of regulation inevitably raises the question: if today’s target is public channels, and tomorrow another new mode of communication emerges that blurs the line between public and private, will the boundaries of regulation shift once again?
Europe's Response in the Global Digital Rules Competition
The European Union's escalated regulation of WhatsApp channels has implications that extend far beyond Brussels and Menlo Park (the location of Meta's headquarters). This is a crucial move in the global competition to set digital rules. While the United States remains deadlocked in partisan disputes over platform regulation, and other regions are still navigating their way forward, the EU—leveraging the scale of its single market and its determination to legislate proactively—is emerging as a de facto exporter of digital regulations. The DSA and DMA are increasingly serving as blueprints referenced by many jurisdictions worldwide in their legislative efforts.
This event also indicates that large technology platforms will face increasingly complex compliance puzzles in their global operations. They can no longer adhere to a one-size-fits-all global policy but must design specific operational models for regions like the European Union, which possesses strong regulatory capabilities and a clear rule system. For WhatsApp, it may need to deploy stronger content moderation teams, more transparent algorithms, and risk control processes different from other regions for its channel features in the EU. Although this regionalized operation increases costs, it may also force platforms to raise the ceiling of their global governance systems.
From a broader perspective, this tug-of-war between regulation and anti-regulation defines a key conflict in the digital society over the next decade: how to address harmful content, misinformation, and power abuses in cyberspace while safeguarding freedom, innovation, and privacy? The European Union has chosen to answer this question by strengthening platform accountability and implementing proactive risk management. Its effectiveness will be preliminarily tested in May 2026, when WhatsApp submits its first comprehensive systematic risk assessment report. At that time, we will see how one of the world's largest communication platforms redefines the boundaries of safety and responsibility in its public space under an unprecedented set of strict rules. The outcome of this experiment will not only impact the experience of European users but also provide a significant European case study for global digital governance.
Reference materials
https://tg24.sky.it/tecnologia/2026/01/26/whatsapp-sorveglianza-rafforzata-ue