Social media platforms have a powerful role as one of the main gatekeepers of the online sphere, alongside search engines and Internet service providers. Yet, given the variety of regulatory mechanisms, technological tools, and nonlegal ethical guidelines employed in regulating content on social media platforms, we argue that there is a need today for a consistent unified formal online content regulation structure. To address this issue, a number of European countries have suggested an old‐new policy instrument—the Internet ombudsperson. This article, therefore, develops the concept, firstly by framing it as part of the evolution of the institution of the media ombudsperson. We then describe the theoretical and conceptual framework of Internet ombudsperson and propose future implementations including a traditional national (mainly offline) model as well as an international blockchain model. We conclude by discussing the merits and drawbacks of our proposal as well as its possible theoretical implications.

中文翻译：

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与网络监察员一起驯服网络巨魔：道德社交媒体法规

社交媒体平台与搜索引擎和互联网服务提供商一道，是在线领域的主要守门人之一，具有强大的作用。然而，鉴于在社交媒体平台上对内容进行监管时使用了各种监管机制，技术工具和非法律道德准则，我们认为，今天需要一个一致的统一的正式在线内容监管结构。为了解决此问题，许多欧洲国家提出了一项新旧的政策工具-互联网监察员。因此，本文首先提出了这一概念，并将其构架为媒体监察员制度发展的一部分。然后，我们描述了互联网监察员的理论和概念框架，并提出了包括传统的国家（主要是离线）模型以及国际区块链模型在内的未来实现方案。最后，我们讨论了该提案的优缺点以及其可能的理论含义。