EU Charges X With Violations, Musk Alleges Covert Censorship Deal

Elon Musk has accused the European Commission of attempting to strike a covert deal with X, his social media company, to censor content without public knowledge. According to Musk, the EU offered to forgo fines if X complied with secret censorship. He tweeted, “The European Commission offered X an illegal secret deal: if we quietly censored speech without telling anyone, they would not fine us. The other platforms accepted that deal.”

These accusations follow the European Commission’s charges against X for violating the Digital Services Act (DSA). Margrethe Vestager, the executive vice president of the European Commission, highlighted X’s non-compliance with transparency requirements, misleading users, and failing to provide adequate advertisement data. The DSA, enacted in February, aims to regulate social media platforms by ensuring they remove harmful content and misinformation. Non-compliance could result in fines up to 6% of global revenue.

The commission’s specific concerns include X’s blue checkmark system. Traditionally, the blue checkmark verified public figures, but Musk changed it to signify paid subscribers, which the EU argues misleads users about account authenticity. Additionally, X was criticized for not providing searchable and reliable information about advertisements, which is a DSA requirement.

Musk responded to these charges by threatening legal action, asserting that he looks forward to a “very public battle in court, so that the people of Europe can know the truth.” He stressed the importance of transparency and the need to fight what he perceives as unfair regulatory practices.

The ongoing conflict between Musk’s management of X and European regulatory bodies underscores the broader challenges of social media governance and the balance between free speech and regulation.