European Union Orders Probe Against Elon Musk’s X; Know Why

New Delhi: Elon Musk’s X is in trouble as the European Union (EU) on Monday announced formal ‘infringement proceedings’ against the social media platform.

EU’s action is part of a crackdown on illegal online content after it identified ‘disinformation’ related to the October 7 attacks by Palestinian militant organisation Hamas on Israel, reported AFP.

The EU earlier this year implemented the Digital Services Act (DSA), a legislation that strengthens online platforms’ responsibility towards content moderation.

This is the first action against a major online platform since the legislation came into place.

“Today’s opening of formal proceedings against X makes it clear that, with the DSA, the time of big online platforms behaving like they are ‘too big to care’ has come to an end,” EU commissioner Thierry Breton said.

“We will now start an in-depth investigation of X’s compliance with the DSA obligations concerning countering the dissemination and amplification of illegal content and disinformation in the EU, transparency of the platforms and design of the user interface,” Breton added.

According to European Commission, preliminary information gathering investigation was carried out against X in October, leading to the probe against X.

The EU investigation will examine dissemination of illegal content, effectiveness of X’s efforts to combat disinformation, suspected restrictions on giving researchers access to its data and suspected deceptive practices known as ‘dark patterns’.

If proved guilty, fines up to 6% of an online company’s global revenues could be levied.

For serious and repeated violations, EU can ban a platform operating in the 27-nation bloc.