Should the media get special privileges on online platforms?

This paper examines whether news media should receive special procedural protections on very large online platforms, focusing on the debate around the proposed “media exemption” in the Digital Services Act (DSA) and Article 17 of the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA). It reconstructs the main arguments for and against such privileges, highlighting tensions between media freedom, platform power, disinformation risks, and the difficulty of defining which actors or content should qualify for protection. The paper concludes that any workable solution must avoid blanket exemptions, be embedded in a broader anti-disinformation and co-regulatory framework, and combine clearer definitions, accountability mechanisms, and differentiated procedural safeguards for trustworthy editorial content.