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In an effort to blunt the spread of racist and extremist content on the web, European Union states along with听Google, Twitter, Facebook, and Microsoft have agreed on a so-called听听to review 鈥� and then delete听at their discretion听鈥� suspected hate speech.

But some civil liberty and听Internet advocacy groups worry that听anointing tech companies as guardians against offensive speech raises privacy concerns for users and concerns about the companies'听overzealous enforcement of the code.

"The code requires private companies to be the educator of online speech, which shouldn鈥檛 be their role, and it鈥檚 also not necessarily the role that they want to play," says Estelle听Mass茅, the EU policy analyst with Access Now, a nonprofit digital advocacy organization based in Brussels.

The code is meant to encourage companies to become more vigilant at removing content that violates their own terms of service but that doesn't necessarily violate European law.听The problem for civil liberty groups such as Access Now is that companies may monitor for and remove content merely because听it鈥檚听controversial听and they feel they face a liability by leaving it online, says Ms.听Mass茅.听

, Access Now said: "Countering hate speech online is an important issue that requires open and transparent discussions to ensure compliance with human rights obligations."

The code will be reviewed by EU听Justice Ministries next week but is otherwise final. It grew out of pressure on听Internet companies operating in Europe to do more to remove extremist content and propaganda from their networks in the aftermath of the Islamic State attacks in Paris.听

Initially, a forum to counter online hate speech that took shape at the end of 2015 initially included groups such as Access Now and European Digital Rights (EDRi), a civil society听association听based in Brussels. Those groups recently pulled out of talks about the code over differences with the other members of the forum, saying that the European Commission and US tech companies dictated the terms of the new code.

"This non颅binding code lets companies to remove content, especially on the basis of terms of service and not on the law,鈥� says听Maryant Fern谩ndez, advocacy manager at EDRi. "The outcome of these processes is that you are actually privatizing the enforcement of human rights."

Still, European officials say the code is a critical tool for combating the spread of extremist content that encourages violence.

"Social media is unfortunately one of the tools that terrorist groups use to radicalize young people and racists use to spread violence and hatred," said V臅ra Jourov谩, EU Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality, in a statement听on Tuesday. "This agreement is an important step forward to ensure that the听Internet remains a place of free and democratic expression."

Europol, the European law enforcement agency, recently created听Internet referral units that gives companies information when something illegal is posted on their website. However, it鈥檚 up to individual companies whether they will remove the content.听

The code defines hate speech as "all conduct publicly inciting to violence or hatred directed against a group of persons or a member of such a group defined by reference to race, color, religion, descent or national or ethnic origin."

But there's no consensus across Europe when it comes to identifying that kind of speech as听EU members varying interpretations of extremist or criminal language.听Denying the Holocaust, for example, constitutes a crime in Germany but not elsewhere in the EU.

Instead of having tech companies police the web for offensive speech, says听Burkhard Schr枚der, cofounder of the nonprofit German Privacy Fund, Internet users should be the ones who decide what's appropriate and what's not.听

鈥淚f someone posts something听anti-Semitic听on Facebook, there will be 1 million people posting against it,鈥� says Mr. Schr枚der. "It鈥檚 better to let the brains of the people than a company decide."

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