The European Commission on Thursday described how companies including Alphabet (GOOGL) - Get Report , Facebook (FB) - Get Report , and Twitter (TWTR) - Get Report should extinguish illegal content from the internet more quickly while pressuring the companies to step up their efforts to do so, Reuters reports.

The Commission established a set of guidelines detailing how these internet companies can speed up the rate at which the content is removed and make it more efficient. These included implementing trusted flaggers or allocating more capital to automation detection technologies.

Illegal content across the internet has led to debate throughout Europe between those who argue it impedes free speech and those who urge that media firms should do more to remove such content.

"The rule of law applies online just as much as offline. We cannot accept a digital Wild West, and we must act," said EU justice commissioner Vera Jourova.

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