Platform Accountability and Transparency Act

Summary#

This bill creates a program run by the National Science Foundation (NSF) with input from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The program will approve "qualified research projects" that let vetted researchers at U.S. universities or nonprofit organizations access certain data from large online platforms (those with at least 50,000,000 monthly U.S. users). The FTC must set privacy and cybersecurity safeguards for how platforms share data and how researchers store and use it. Some data is excluded from sharing, including private direct messages, biometric data, and precise geolocation. Platforms that comply with the law get a legal safe harbor for sharing data with approved researchers. Researchers must use the data only for the approved research, may not try to reidentify people or share the data, and can face civil or criminal enforcement for violations. The NSF and the FTC will publish criteria, review applications, and report annually to Congress about approved projects. The bill also creates a separate safe harbor for journalists and researchers who collect publicly available information from platform interfaces if they take steps to protect privacy. In addition, the FTC must write rules requiring large platforms to publish ongoing transparency information about widely shared content, advertising, recommender or ranking algorithms, content moderation, and data dictionaries to help researchers.

What it means for you#

• Users: Platforms may share some platform data with approved researchers under privacy protections. Private messages, biometric data, and precise location are excluded.
• Researchers: Eligible university and nonprofit researchers can apply to the NSF for access to data for noncommercial, public-interest projects. They must follow FTC security and privacy rules and submit approved findings for prepublication review.
• Platforms: Platforms meeting the user threshold must provide approved data under FTC-set safeguards, publish transparency reports and data tools, and may get a legal safe harbor when they comply.
• Journalists and independent researchers: The bill offers a safe harbor for collecting publicly available information from platform interfaces for public-interest reporting if privacy protections are used.

Expenses#

The bill authorizes appropriations "such sums as are necessary" for fiscal year 2026 and later to carry out the program. No publicly available information on estimated total costs or budgetary impacts is provided in the bill text.

Proponents' View#

Supporters wrote the bill to enable independent, privacy-protected research into how large online platforms affect society. The bill aims to give researchers access to data that would not otherwise be available, require platforms to provide clearer public information about ads, algorithms, and moderation, and protect user privacy through FTC-designed safeguards.

Opponents' View#

No publicly available information.