EU: at least 30 percent of Netflix and Amazon Prime must be European Europees

The on-demand offering of video services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video must consist of at least 30 percent European content. This has been agreed by the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission.

The purpose of the obligation is to promote European works. This is a preliminary agreement on the amendments to the Audiovisual Media Services Directive. It has yet to be approved by the Member States and the European Parliament.

The requirement of 30 percent is higher than that of two years ago, when the target was still 20 percent. A survey of 75 video-on-demand services already showed that 27 percent of the content was European and therefore the conditions were already met.

Under the draft directive, Member States can require the services to contribute to the payment of European video productions. Furthermore, the directive states that the services take measures to protect minors from harmful content. This also applies to platforms that allow users to share videos, such as on Facebook. The rules against hate speech and calls to terrorism have also been tightened.