EPC exposes the core paradox in the Digital Omnibus proposal

EPC
7 hours ago
2 min read

At a time when media plurality and professional journalism face sustained economic and technological pressure, including intense competition from dominant platforms that capture most digital advertising growth and increasingly substitute publisher content with AI-generated answers, the Digital Omnibus proposal reveals a striking inconsistency at the heart of EU digital policy. It fails to create a framework that genuinely supports the sustainability of European publishers.

The Commission is right to acknowledge that the current consent-heavy regime has led to widespread consent fatigue. The proliferation of cookie banners has not strengthened user trust. Instead, it has distorted the advertising market, increased compliance costs, and diverted investment away from privacy-enhancing technologies and innovation.

Yet the proposal does not address the root problem, the structural over-reliance on consent.

Under the draft Article 88a, publishers remain effectively confined to consent as the primary legal basis for processing data from users’ terminal equipment, even for low-risk, first-party activities essential to funding journalism, such as audience measurement, fraud prevention and advertising.

This is not a technical detail. It has structural consequences.

Paradoxically, while publishers are denied meaningful flexibility under Article 6 GDPR, the proposal allows data processing necessary for the development and operation of AI systems to rely on legitimate interest. In practice, this permits large-scale processing for AI model development and training, including the use of publisher content, on a broader legal basis than that available to publishers within their own ecosystems.

The result is regulatory asymmetry.

Publishers must obtain consent to sustain their direct relationship with readers, while AI developers may invoke legitimate interest for systemic processing that reshapes markets and competes with journalistic output.

This sits uneasily with the Commission’s broader policy commitments. The European Democracy Shield recognises that free and plural media are central to democratic resilience, and the European Media Industry Outlook acknowledges that AI may threaten existing business models. Yet the Digital Omnibus contains no concrete measure to reinforce media sustainability and no adjustment to reflect these realities.

If media plurality is essential to democracy, the legal framework should not weaken its economic foundations but boost it.

EPC supports simplification and strong data protection. We do not call for lower standards, but for coherence. A genuine application of the GDPR’s risk-based approach would allow low-risk, first-party processing by publishers to rely on legitimate interest, while preserving consent for higher-risk activities. This would reduce consent fatigue, encourage privacy-enhancing technologies, and restore balance between those who produce trusted journalism and those who depend on it.

EPC has set out concrete amendment options to achieve that balance in its full position paper.