EU fines Elon Musk's X €120m for Digital Services Act breaches
The European Union has fined Elon Musk's social media platform X €120 million for three breaches of the Digital Services Act (DSA). The breaches include deceptive blue-tick verification, shortfalls in advertising transparency, and failure to provide researchers access to public data.
The fine is broken down as €45 million for deceptive verification practices, €35 million for violations related to ad regulation, and €40 million for data-access failures. The Digital Services Act requires platforms like X to maintain a public advertiser repository, protect users against illegal scams and political manipulation, and ensure researchers can access platform data.
This investigation, opened in December 2023, marks the first ruling under the DSA against X for non-compliance. Penalties under the act can reach up to 6% of worldwide revenue; X's estimated 2024 revenue is between $2.5 and $2.7 billion. Additionally, three other EU investigations remain ongoing, including probing content algorithms since Musk's 2022 takeover and possible breaches involving incitement to violence and illegal content reporting mechanisms.
The ruling is seen as part of broader tensions between EU and US tech interests, with the EU asserting its sovereign regulatory rights. Discussions have included tariff and regulatory alignments to ease tensions. Henna Virkkunen, European Commission executive vice-president for tech regulation, stated that X undermined users' rights and accountability by engaging in deceptive blue tick use, maintaining opaque advertising practices, and blocking researchers from accessing data – actions deemed unacceptable.
X has 90 days to present an action plan and may appeal the ruling at the European Court of Justice. Meanwhile, TikTok has made commitments to provide advertising repositories in response to transparency concerns raised by the EU earlier in May.
