European Commissioner Thierry Breton announced an investigation into Elon Musk’s ‘free speech’ social media platform X for failure to combat ‘illicit content and disinformation.’ This is the first major probe the EU has opened up on X since last year’s passing of a new law called the “Digital Services Act.”
“Today we open formal infringement proceedings against @X” under the Digital Services Act, European Commissioner Breton wrote in a post on Monday morning on X.
“The Commission will now investigate X’s systems and policies related to certain suspected infringements,” spokesman Johannes Bahrke told reporters in Brussels, adding, “It does not prejudge the outcome of the investigation.”
The investigation is centered on whether X failed to stop the spread of ‘illegal content’ (in other words, non-approved government narratives) and whether the Community Notes feature is enough to combat “information manipulation.”
An investigation into X’s business practices was signaled by the EU as early as October, following the Israel-Gaza conflict in which officials warned that “terrorist and violent content and hate speech” was spreading on the social media platform.
“The time of big online platforms behaving like they are ‘too big to care’ has come to an end,” Breton stated.
Hellbound and Down 