ChatGPT, Reddit and Roblox Have Four Months to Meet New EU Online Rules

The European Commission has designated ChatGPT as a Very Large Online Search Engine and Reddit and Roblox as Very Large Online Platforms under the Digital Services Act, the European Union's online content law, according to a designation notice the Commission published Aug. 31.

The designations rest on figures the companies reported themselves. The three services "declared that they reach at least 45 million average monthly users in the EU and thus meet the threshold for designation," the notice says. That number is the services' own declaration, not an independently measured audience count.

Following notification of the designations, the three services have four months, or until January 2027, to comply with the additional DSA obligations that apply to very large platforms and search engines, the Commission said. The notice describes those obligations as assessing and mitigating the systemic risks stemming from the services and their algorithmic systems. It lists the areas covered: the dissemination of illegal content, negative effects on minors, users' physical and mental well-being, fundamental rights, electoral processes and public security.

The two designations are not interchangeable. The Commission applied the search-engine category, abbreviated VLOSE, to ChatGPT alone, and the platform category, VLOP, to Reddit and Roblox.

The notice was published on the Commission's Shaping Europe's Digital Future site and links to the Commission's existing pages on the supervision of designated platforms and search engines under the DSA and on user rights under the law.