EU charges Elon Musk’s X for letting disinfo run wild
The tech mogul’s platform is the first to get hit with charges under new EU social media law.
The European Union is calling Elon Musk to order over how he turned social media site X into a haven for disinformation and illegal content.
The EU Commission on Friday formally charged X for failing to respect EU social media law. The platform could face a sweeping multi-million euro fine in a pioneering case under the bloc's new Digital Services Act (DSA), a law to clamp down on toxic and illegal online content and algorithms.
Musk's X has been in Brussels' crosshairs ever since the billionaire took over the company, formerly known as Twitter, in 2022. X has been accused of letting disinformation and illegal hate speech run wild, roll out misleading authentication features and blocking external researchers from tools to scrutinize how malicious content on the platforms spreads.
The European Commission oversees X and two dozens of the world's largest online platforms including Facebook, YouTube and others. The EU executive's probe into Musk's firm opened in December 2023 and was the first formal investigation. Friday's charges are the first-ever under the DSA.
Infringements of the DSA could lead to fines of up to 6 percent of a X’s global revenue.
X vs. EU: Elon Musk hit with probe over spread of toxic content
The tech giant is the first to face the full force of Europe’s new social media rules.Clothilde Goujard (POLITICO)
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in reply to MicroWave • • •This is the best summary I could come up with:
The European Union is calling Elon Musk to order over how he turned social media site X into a haven for disinformation and illegal content.
The platform could face a sweeping multi-million euro fine in a pioneering case under the bloc's new Digital Services Act (DSA), a law to clamp down on toxic and illegal online content and algorithms.
X has been accused of letting disinformation and illegal hate speech run wild, roll out misleading authentication features and blocking external researchers from tools to scrutinize how malicious content on the platforms spreads.
In preliminary findings, the Commission said X's platform so-called blue checks had misled users into thinking some content was trustworthy when it wasn't necessarily.
The platform also didn't respect an obligation to provide a searchable and reliable advertisement repository and limited access to its public data to researchers, the Commission said.
The EU so far launched investigations under the DSA into companies including AliExpres
... show moreThis is the best summary I could come up with:
The European Union is calling Elon Musk to order over how he turned social media site X into a haven for disinformation and illegal content.
The platform could face a sweeping multi-million euro fine in a pioneering case under the bloc's new Digital Services Act (DSA), a law to clamp down on toxic and illegal online content and algorithms.
X has been accused of letting disinformation and illegal hate speech run wild, roll out misleading authentication features and blocking external researchers from tools to scrutinize how malicious content on the platforms spreads.
In preliminary findings, the Commission said X's platform so-called blue checks had misled users into thinking some content was trustworthy when it wasn't necessarily.
The platform also didn't respect an obligation to provide a searchable and reliable advertisement repository and limited access to its public data to researchers, the Commission said.
The EU so far launched investigations under the DSA into companies including AliExpress, Meta’s Facebook and Instagram and TikTok over alleged problems like insufficient consumer protection and addictive algorithms.
The original article contains 389 words, the summary contains 172 words. Saved 56%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
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GitHubRestrictedAccount
in reply to MicroWave • • •like this
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rsuri
in reply to RestrictedAccount • • •Verified Accounts on X Are Thriving As They Spread Israel-Hamas Conflict Misinformation
ProPublicamaynarkh
in reply to MicroWave • • •dustycups
in reply to maynarkh • • •maynarkh
in reply to dustycups • • •dustycups
in reply to maynarkh • • •I can just imagine them hiding offending tweets in the EU only and letting the rest of us suffer.
It would be easier to just delete them but, well, musk.
snekerpimp
in reply to MicroWave • • •like this
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Bassman1805
in reply to snekerpimp • • •snekerpimp
in reply to Bassman1805 • • •WEFshill202
in reply to snekerpimp • • •snekerpimp
in reply to WEFshill202 • • •Musk will buy a company and tank it for the memes. I don’t think a warning shot like this will sway his decisions on the direction of said company. The people making the decisions aren’t culpable, the company is. The people making the decisions will just leave to a different company and we can start the whole process over again.
I hope it’s enough and I sound like a bitter old man.
nomous
in reply to snekerpimp • • •snekerpimp
in reply to nomous • • •Fedizen
in reply to snekerpimp • • •Tja
in reply to Fedizen • • •barsoap
in reply to snekerpimp • • •Historically, no, because companies still misbehave, the fines aren't high enough for them to not try and see whether they get away with stuff.
OTOH, historically, yes, because once fines come flying companies shape up.
That is, they're willing to gamble on that initial fine, but absolutely won't tank the recurring fines for continued infringement.
Donut
in reply to Bassman1805 • • •Donut
in reply to snekerpimp • • •It's 6% of revenue, not profit. So it cuts even more into profits as it doesn't allow a company in breach of regulations to reduce the impact of the fine by adding expenses that will temporarily lower their profit.
Even more spicy, they can also impose periodic penalties up to 5% of the average daily worldwide turnover for each day of delay in complying. That shit can bankrupt you.
snekerpimp
in reply to Donut • • •vxx
in reply to Donut • • •brucethemoose
in reply to Donut • • •Or Musk could pull Twitter out of the EU.
That would be so wonderful. The EU economy would probably take off just from the saved time/brainpower, lol.
Mrkawfee
in reply to MicroWave • • •Viking_Hippie
in reply to Mrkawfee • • •You see, Twitter does that AND deliberately elevates far right conspiracies and other extremist content AND deliberately censors or at least delays opposing views.
I'm not saying that the EU shouldn't also go after the other platforms you mention (they ABSOLUTELY should and probably will), but Twitter is tied with Facebook if not alone in first place when it comes to spreading disinformation.
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Donut
in reply to Mrkawfee • • •Tja
in reply to Donut • • •suction
in reply to Mrkawfee • • •atro_city
in reply to MicroWave • • •like this
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Viking_Hippie
in reply to atro_city • • •suction
in reply to atro_city • • •blazera
in reply to MicroWave • • •Disinformation is words
It spreads on twitter, it spreads on facebook, on tiktok, on youtube, on discord, text messages, books, speeches, talking to coworkers. This is like the war on drugs except even easier to circumvent any bans. Youre not gonna beat disinformation by trying to block it.
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Avid Amoeba
in reply to blazera • • •Pennomi
in reply to Avid Amoeba • • •Avid Amoeba
in reply to Pennomi • • •mosiacmango
in reply to Avid Amoeba • • •TechCrunch is part of the Yahoo family of brands
techcrunch.comAvid Amoeba
in reply to mosiacmango • • •Pennomi
in reply to Avid Amoeba • • •Avid Amoeba
in reply to Pennomi • • •blazera
in reply to Avid Amoeba • • •ripcord
in reply to blazera • • •blazera
in reply to ripcord • • •fluxion
in reply to blazera • • •You're also not going to beat it by not trying to deal with it. The transition from twitter being an unreliable source to becoming an unbridled dumpster fire of disinformation and hate campaigns has a direct correlation with Musk taking specific steps to cater to those audiences while ripping out any facilities to filter it.
It's not all or nothing, like basically everything else in life, it requires balance. Just like you don't have to "beat" drugs to help drug users find a better path, you don't have to "beat" disinformation in order to help stop it from spreading. You can take steps when/where they make sense to limit the damage and give people a chance to pull their head out of the cesspool to get enough air that society can function in a manner in tune with reality to some degree.
blazera
in reply to fluxion • • •The war on drugs notably did not involve helping users find a better path, it only tried to block the path of drug use, with pretty disastrous results as drug users became pariahs pushed to more dangerous avenues of drug sources to get around the blocks.
The only thing we are talking about here is a block from one path of disinformation. Theyll get pushed to the fringes of more dangerous sources of misinformation.
fluxion
in reply to blazera • • •I'm not talking about the war on drugs, I'm talking about the fact that rehab facilities, education, counseling/medical aid are helpful to curtailing an out of control drug epidemic and reducing the negative impact on society.
Just because the "war on drugs" failed doesn't drug-related issues can't be addressed to some degree. You focus on completely blocking misinformation so it doesn't exist, I'm trying to point out other considerations: ranking, exposure, flagging/reviewing posts, community notes to provide additional context. These are all things that exist, that are used heavily, that impact our information feeds 24/7, and that will continue to be used to significant effect on the general population, whether for good or for bad. More likely the latter if everyone adopts perspectives like yours.
blazera
in reply to fluxion • • •I am talking about the war on drugs, as that is what this is akin to, purely trying to block disinformation.
All of the "other considerations" youve added, except for community context, are just tools to block. Like the war on drugs using drug tests, drug sniffing dogs, report hotlines, methods to find drugs and punish for it.
Community context is a good example of things that do work, that is akin to educating people about drugs rather than trying to block them. But twitter has that tool, twitter is being punished for not blocking misinformation.
fluxion
in reply to blazera • • •blazera
in reply to fluxion • • •I just wrote out a long response, ending with the idea that if misinformation gets removed from twitter, its only because its moved somewhere less visible to the public. And then realized i was arguing disinformation would be less visible to the public.
Kick Musk's ass EU
etuomaala
in reply to blazera • • •Bravo, blazera. It's always nice to see some concern for the truth on the internet. I mean this very unsarcastically.
I don't think I've ever seen somebody publicly changing their mind on the internet until I came here. Perhaps there is something special about lemmy.
The internet needs more of this. Maybe lemmy can amplify public mind changings like this somehow...
eltrain123
in reply to blazera • • •No, but he is finding out why twitter had all of its policies on combatting misinformation before he took over and gutted the staff… to prevent getting sued. You can say anything you want in America and the government can’t tell you that you aren’t allowed to say it, but you are still accountable for the damages caused by what you say… just ask Alex Jones.
But operating in other countries doesn’t afford the same protections from government scrutiny.
Disinformation campaigns are part of the reason social media is causing as much social strife in the world. It is not outside a logical line of thought that governments are going to attempt to minimize the damages from platforms like Twitter when they can. You may not beat misinformation, but you can minimize the financial incentive to promote it if you fine the fuck out of it when you find it.
blazera
in reply to eltrain123 • • •Hacksaw
in reply to blazera • • •If you make a deal with someone to come on your front porch every day yelling hate speech into your loudspeaker I think you'll find it's pretty easy to be held accountable for what other people say.
Second, if you'll remember, Twitter makes money from showing adds on this speech. It's not like they're doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. Profiting from hate speech isn't going to be looked at kindly.
blazera
in reply to Hacksaw • • •Hacksaw
in reply to blazera • • •blazera
in reply to Hacksaw • • •Hacksaw
in reply to blazera • • •That's not what I said. In neither situation does the deal enforce that the person HAS to use the loudspeaker for hate speech. I wish I could blame your reading comprehension but it's painfully obvious you're arguing in bad faith since this is the pedantic detail you're stuck on instead of the rest of my argument.
Every Twitter user makes a deal with Twitter to get an account. This deal includes what's acceptable behaviour. If Twitter's policy allows hate speech then it's Twitter's fault their platform is spreading hate speech. If Twitter's policy prohibits hate speech then it's still their fault because they're not enforcing their policy. This is something Twitter had no problem with before their degenerate new owner fired the enforcement team.
Now let's see what pedantic detail you get stuck on this time instead of facing the fact Twitter is liable for enabling hate speech to spread faster than ever before!
blazera
in reply to Hacksaw • • •All social media has had this problem for as long as its existed.
Musk is terrible, but he didnt buy twitter until after trumps presidency. After covid. Dont underestimate how much misinformation has occurred in the past.
Hacksaw
in reply to blazera • • •"it was bad before so no point fighting now"
That's what you sound like. Not to mention it's undeniable that Twitter has more hate speech after apartheid emerald mine oligarch Musk bought it with Saudi money.
phys.org/news/2023-04-analysis…
Analysis finds hate speech has significantly increased on Twitter
Julia Cohen (Phys.org)blazera
in reply to Hacksaw • • •Oh my god he brought out the thats what you sound like
Thats a really short timeframe to draw conclusions from, with how noisy the graph is and an obvious temporary spike immediately following the takeover. Heres a wider angle graph digitalplanet.tufts.edu/wp-con… but even that is too short of a timeframe to get much use out of. I would love to see the data around 2016.
Flying Squid
in reply to blazera • • •floofloof
in reply to blazera • • •The article states that the EU is objecting to a couple of particular things:
This is not some amorphous campaign against disinformation, it's a challenge to two specific policies of X.
Viking_Hippie
in reply to MicroWave • • •Sometimes it's fun to be a grammar Nazi.
Knowing that omitting the word "other" implies that the hangout of REAL Nazis is at most the 25th largest online platform is one of those times 😁
audiomodder
in reply to MicroWave • • •Snapz
in reply to MicroWave • • •cows_are_underrated
in reply to Snapz • • •Flying Squid
in reply to Snapz • • •Also, he just says he's autistic. As far as is known, he's never actually gotten an evaluation.
So he's not just using autism as an excuse, he might not even have autism. And he wouldn't, sadly, be the first to pretend he did to excuse his behavior.
oce 🐆
in reply to MicroWave • • •This a French scientific study showing how the Russian regime tries to influence the political debate in France with Twitter accounts, especially before the last parliamentary elections. The goal is to promote a party that is more favorable to them, namely, the far right. hal.science/hal-04629585v1/fil…
In France, we have a concept called the "Republican front" that is kind of tacit agreement between almost all parties, left, center and right, to work together to prevent far-right from reaching power and threaten the values of the French Republic. This front has been weakening at every election, with the far right rising and lately some of the traditional right joining them. But it still worked out at the last one, far right was given first by the polls, but thanks to the front, they eventually ended up 3rd.
What this article says, is that the Russian regime has been working for years to invert this front and push most parties to co
... show moreThis a French scientific study showing how the Russian regime tries to influence the political debate in France with Twitter accounts, especially before the last parliamentary elections. The goal is to promote a party that is more favorable to them, namely, the far right. hal.science/hal-04629585v1/fil…
In France, we have a concept called the "Republican front" that is kind of tacit agreement between almost all parties, left, center and right, to work together to prevent far-right from reaching power and threaten the values of the French Republic. This front has been weakening at every election, with the far right rising and lately some of the traditional right joining them. But it still worked out at the last one, far right was given first by the polls, but thanks to the front, they eventually ended up 3rd.
What this article says, is that the Russian regime has been working for years to invert this front and push most parties to consider that it is part of the left that is against the Republic values, more than the far right.
One of their most cynical tactic is using videos from the Gaza war to traumatize leftists until they say something that may sound antisemitic. Then they repost those words and push the agenda that the left is antisemitic and therefore against the Republican values.
cows_are_underrated
in reply to oce 🐆 • • •uis
in reply to cows_are_underrated • • •All countries with UHC. Although it can be argued that countries without UHC are undermining themselves.
Putin on the other hand undermines every country. Even Russia.
floofloof
in reply to uis • • •uis
in reply to floofloof • • •floofloof
in reply to uis • • •The Five Questions Nigel Farage is Never Asked About Brexit, Trump and Russia – Byline Times
Peter Jukes (Byline Times)brucethemoose
in reply to MicroWave • • •What if Musk pulls Twitter out of the EU? What fraction of their revenue is that, I wonder?
Normally this would be too crazy to even consider, but... this is Musk we're talking about. I'm sure he hates the EU government's guts already. And that totally sounds like an impulse decision he would make.
OsrsNeedsF2P
in reply to brucethemoose • • •RubberDuck
in reply to brucethemoose • • •We can only hope he does. More people move over to mastodon with large companies running their own instances in the ecosystem.
This would allow for a federated broadcast system similar to how Twitter is now used, but if mastodon gets critical mass and governments start using it like they do Vichy Twitter it would be great news.
If that leads to some extra government grants for the further development of mastodon and the fediverse... Possibly even under the guise of standing up to big american tech.. we all win.
But if he does, he signed the Death warrant of his own platform. A lot of governments and mega corps are there because of users. Governments will all need to replace it immediately if they find out their main broadcasting platform could be turned off tomorrow.
barsoap
in reply to RubberDuck • • •Gsus4
in reply to brucethemoose • • •Tja
in reply to brucethemoose • • •suction
in reply to Tja • • •Tja
in reply to suction • • •suction
in reply to Tja • • •Tja
in reply to suction • • •TurtleJoe
in reply to brucethemoose • • •Gsus4
in reply to TurtleJoe • • •AwesomeLowlander
in reply to Gsus4 • • •cows_are_underrated
in reply to AwesomeLowlander • • •Alexandra Lanes
in reply to cows_are_underrated • •World News reshared this.
AwesomeLowlander
in reply to cows_are_underrated • • •cows_are_underrated
in reply to AwesomeLowlander • • •100_kg_90_de_belin
in reply to AwesomeLowlander • • •AwesomeLowlander
in reply to 100_kg_90_de_belin • • •uis
in reply to brucethemoose • • •brucethemoose
in reply to uis • • •Gsus4
in reply to MicroWave • • •Etterra
in reply to MicroWave • • •MBM
in reply to Etterra • • •anticurrent
in reply to MicroWave • • •They need to first move out their official's accounts out of twitter If they really want to lead by example, there is Threads and mastodon and what not!
Seeing how Facebook and Instagram have been shutting down posts about Israeli atrocities in Gaza. and deleting Palestinian Journalists accounts, Such moves to try and police what is fake news and what isn't by governments according to their own interests and biases is an attack on free speech and freedom of the press.
Endriu
in reply to anticurrent • • •They already post on Mastodon
ec.social-network.europa.eu/@E…
Am guessing it's the case of trying to be on all social media platforms where people are.
anticurrent
in reply to Endriu • • •NecroSocial
in reply to MicroWave • • •Not saying this out of any support for Elon or Twitter, just because I respect free speech.
It would be nice if the US pushed back on the EU on this type of thing. Going after platforms for the speech of their users, especially with a government mandated monetary incentive behind it, is an open door for censorship and unfairness. A US company, born under the auspices of a nation where free speech is literally rule number one, should be defended by the US government when other nations create rules attempting to stifle that free speech (especially when those rules also come with huge fines which siphon money, however much, from the US economy).
Governments should be developing ways to stop bots and botnets not stifling human public expression, no matter how disagreeable to the political sensibilities of those governments that expression may be.
mrgalaxy
in reply to NecroSocial • • •Drivebyhaiku
in reply to NecroSocial • • •The issues with the US bulling their way in here is that while they set themselves up as the arbiters of free speech... these are not your counties. These are democratic institutions who have made independently made these decisions based on their concepts of what constitutes safeguarding the welfare of their citizens. They have determined that repeat targetted provably untrue propaganda based out of intellectual dishonesty that is designed to leave people angry at minorities creates conditions where people logically come to the conclusion that the killing, oppressing and subjugation of people to the point they see death as preferable to life is not okay.
The version of "free speech" that constantly gets toted as a universal good is essentially an experiment. When you see how something is functionally shaping your society and you see that while aspects of it are very healthy and cause additional stability and protection to people but a misuse is causing some people to be treated as subhuman then it's time to amend the rules. A government should be held accountable for the wel
... show moreThe issues with the US bulling their way in here is that while they set themselves up as the arbiters of free speech... these are not your counties. These are democratic institutions who have made independently made these decisions based on their concepts of what constitutes safeguarding the welfare of their citizens. They have determined that repeat targetted provably untrue propaganda based out of intellectual dishonesty that is designed to leave people angry at minorities creates conditions where people logically come to the conclusion that the killing, oppressing and subjugation of people to the point they see death as preferable to life is not okay.
The version of "free speech" that constantly gets toted as a universal good is essentially an experiment. When you see how something is functionally shaping your society and you see that while aspects of it are very healthy and cause additional stability and protection to people but a misuse is causing some people to be treated as subhuman then it's time to amend the rules. A government should be held accountable for the welfare of all it's citizens and those non-citizens whom it has temporary sovereignty over. Each country has the right to determine how best to initiate that directive. You are very welcome to defend your version of free speech as defined by American sensibilities on American ground, but American meddling in the ethics of countries whose value systems deal in more nuance would be very unwelcome. Quite frankly since the application of "free speech" under American terms has caused so much political stratification in their own homeland to the point where civil war or a breakdown of other democratic norms are snowballing they need to see to their own house before they can critique other nations.
floofloof
in reply to NecroSocial • • •The EU is going after X for selling blue check marks while marketing them as a sign of trustworthiness. They claim this is misleading. They're not going after X for anything the users said.
azuth
in reply to NecroSocial • • •US companies can ~~fuck off~~ withdraw from the EU.
Also the US is not pro free speech. The first amendment only prevents the government from censoring not private entities such as twitter and other social media. They can in fact and do censor their users so them crying wolf about being censored themselves is ironic. After all they are not even human unlike (well some of) their users.
oce 🐆
in reply to NecroSocial • • •I understand the argument for not letting a government control speech, because it seems against democratic. But when you see what's happening to the USA where about half the voters are voting for someone who wants to undermine its democracy, attack women, the poor and the minorities, maybe you would think that the impact of free hate speech on democracy can be destructive.
Snothvalpen
in reply to NecroSocial • • •Free speech protects journalists from being imprisoned for reporting on events in the world, with the angle to the story they see fit.
Free speech is not about preventing any old fart spewing actual falsifiable lies/misinformation from being silenced on a privately owned platform.
Free speech also isn't about choosing to disregard anti-misinformation laws in other parts of the world, in the name of said old farts' rights to say anything, but still insisting on serving customers in those same parts of the world.
That's what EU is fighting against. Misinformation spread on a platform serving EU customers is finable. If Twitter/X wants to stick to free speech principles without being fined, they have two options.
1) combat misinformation/lies (this isn't anti free speech)
2) geoblock the EU. Don't do business here
object [Object]
in reply to MicroWave • • •RubberDuck
Unknown parent • • •I also read the term and though.. this fits.
Twitter served a purpose as it allowed yelling into a crowd and people interested could tune into your yelling. Especially for official announcements it was great. I see that there is a need for a broadcast method for companies and even more for governments. Mastodon seems to fit better. It allows them to run their own server and keep it closed so no need to moderate users but still able to have reach.