Elon Musk’s X account shown on the screen of a smartphone against the backdrop of an EU flag in Brussels on 7 January 2025. Musk has stirred up concerns in many parts of the 27-country bloc by meddling in domestic politics, including by throwing insults at German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. (Nicolas Tucat – AFP / Lehtikuva)
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HENNA VIRKKUNEN (NCP), the European Commissioner for tech sovereignty, security and democracy, says the EU is prepared to impose significant fines and penalties on X, the micro-messaging platform owned and controlled by Elon Musk, writes YLE.
Musk has sown political confusion on the continent by insulting and spreading falsehoods about ruling lawmakers to his over 210 million followers on the platform formerly known as Twitter.
At the same time, he has offered the platform as a pulpit for the likes of Alice Weidel, the deputy chairperson of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), and dangled a 100-million-dollar donation in front of Reform UK, the hard-right party led by Nigel Farage. Musk and Farage, though, seem to have fallen out mere weeks after reports of the possible donation had emerged over a disagreement about the former’s support for Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, an imprisoned far-right instigator known better by his alias Tommy Robinson.
Musk and X have to comply with the same rules as all other platforms in the EU, Virkkunen emphasised in an interview with YLE on Friday.
“In Europe, everyone has freedom of speech and opinion. X does have a special responsibility arising from our laws to evaluate and reduce systemic links related to our election systems and public debate,” she stated the public broadcasting company.
EU legislation prescribes, for example, that social media platforms have to make sure that certain political views are not preferred at the expense of others. A key principle for the 27-country bloc is that the internet must be a just and safe environment, a principle that has created challenges for all online platforms, acknowledged Virkkunen.
The EU, she assured, has no intention to give additional leeway to the likes of Musk and Mark Zuckerberg – the CEO of Meta, who last week publicly capitulated to US President-elect Donald Trump by announcing the roll-back of fact-checking and content moderation in a move that mimics the overhaul of X by Musk – out of concern about angering Trump.
A European Commission study found in 2023 that X has the highest proportion of misinformation of the six leading social media platforms. Musk had acquired the platform in late 2022, immediately embarking on a campaign to scale down moderation and fact-checking, in part under the pretext of freedom of speech.
Virkkunen reminded YLE on Friday that the bloc has already opened an investigation into X. If the micro-messaging platform is ruled to violate its rules, the EU can respond by issuing “substantial fines and penalties”.
The European Commission is scheduled to meet representatives of internet behemoths this month to discuss how they should deal with possible election interference in the EU.
Members of European Parliament have criticised the commission for not wielding all of the powers afforded under the EU’s Digital Services Act. Virkkunen responded to the criticism by reminding that the act is fairly new and that large social media platforms were not brought under its scope until last September.
“But very soon after that the commission launched these investigations to see how well the platforms meet the act’s requirements,” she said, assuring that the rules will be applied to the letter.
Aleksi Teivainen – HT
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Source: www.helsinkitimes.fi
