Keyword – EMFA

Polyák, Gábor:

Regulation of public advertising in the draft European Media Freedom Act

The volume and discriminatory distribution of state advertising is one of the most serious problems of the Hungarian media system and media freedom. The original draft of the European Media Freedom Act and the amendments proposed by the LIBE Committee of the European Parliament and of the Council are important attempts to curb this uncontrolled public spending. This paper shows what the European regulatory proposal offers as a solution and how it may be interpreted in the light of the previous practice of the European institutions.

Keywords: EMFA, media freedom, public spending, state advertising, transparency

Bayer, Judit:

EMFA: is an equilibrium of powers possible? The perspectives of NRA independence in the EU media landscape

The cornerstones of the regulatory model proposed by EMFA are the independent media authorities, which will be brought together in a new Board. This would link the Commission, which monitors the application of EU principles, with the sovereign media authorities in the Member States. A deficit in the independence of the authorities not only jeopardises the EMFA, but also threatens to undermine European standards. Although Article 30 of the AVMS Directive makes the independence criteria mandatory from 2020 onwards, in some states (such as Hungary) these are not met or are only formally met. This analysis recalls that there already is a methodology for assessing de facto independence instead of formal independence. It recalls the paradox of the legal regulation of independence and points out that the application of the principle of equidistance rather than a negative interpretation of independence (immunity from something) seems to be the new European direction. According to this approach, the actors would mutually control each other and counterbalance each other’s influence.

Keywords: EMFA, independence of the media, independence of NRAs, media freedom, regulatory model

Koltay, András – Nyakas, Levente:

Question marks on the European regulation of the media in relation to the proposal of the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA)

This analysis reviews the proposal of the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) from an EU and media law perspective. Examining the legal basis of the regulation, it presents the criteria for media regulation at the EU level and, applying it to the proposal, questions the basic objective of the proposal (i.e., the maintaining of the healthy functioning of the EU internal market) and thus the necessity and the form of regulation. Examining certain regulatory subjects of the EMFA proposal, the authors conclude that in its current form violates the principle of subsidiarity and the sovereignty of the member states. If the regulatory purpose of the proposal were to be directed at cross-border services, general guarantee rules would be acceptable without specifying the detailed rules for their implementation in the form of a directive or of a recommendation.

Keywords: EU law, EMFA, media regulation, subsidiarity, member state sovereignty

Simon, Éva:

Transparency of Media Ownership in the European Media Freedom Act: Rules and Missing Points

This study analyses the requirements set in the draft European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) and its accompanying Recommendation about transparency in media ownership. Transparency in media ownership is a prerequisite for measuring media pluralism and limiting media concentration. This paper examines the possibilities for the EU legislator to create a legal framework for the establishment of a public, up-todate and accessible database, in particular in the light of the November 2022 judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union. It argues that, in the case of media service providers, the public interest outweighs privacy and personal data protection while considering the media’s social role, and proposes concrete solutions for the legislator to ensure the adequate transparency of media ownership.

Keywords: access to information, database, data protection, EMFA, EMFA Article 6, privacy, transparency