Simon Hunter
THE OWNER of X (formerly Twitter), Elon Musk, is considering removing the social media platform from European countries such as Spain thanks to new regulations in the region.
The entrepreneur, who is also the CEO of car manufacturer Tesla, has discussed pulling the app’s availability in the European Union or blocking users from accessing it, according to a report on news site Insider.
The revelation comes after an EU official warned Musk last week that the site was spreading fake viral content and disinformation in the wake of the attacks carried out by Hamas on Israeli targets on October 7.
On Wednesday, EU values commissioner V?ra Jourová went further with the criticism.
“We’re seeing a dramatic rise of antisemitic content on online platforms. X, formerly Twitter, seems particularly bad at stepping up to this challenge,” she said, in comments reported by the EU Observer.
Fake media posts have been flooding the platform in recent weeks, and have been allowed to proliferate after Musk reportedly stripped X of an internal tool that was used to identify misinformation.
What’s more, experts have pointed to the fact that accounts that pay for its blue-check subscription service are favoured. If posts from these accounts go viral, their creators can earn revenues, meaning that there is an incentive to share content that will get the biggest reaction, even if it contains misinformation.
One report that recently spread on Twitter accused Israel of having authorised a nuclear weapon strike in Gaza.
In August of this year, the European Union adopted the Digital Services Act (DSA). This establishes a series of rules that are aimed at stopping harmful content from spreading, as well as banning certain user-targeting practices, according to Reuters. It also means that some internal data from sites such as X have to be shared with regulators.
A person familiar with the company told Insider that it was this regulation that had prompted Musk to consider making changes to the availability of the app within the EU.
Read more:
- Spain is tracking more than 300 ‘lone wolves’ amid fears of an Islamist attack
- Spain’s social rights minister Ione Belarra doubles down on criticism of Israel, calling on PM to suspend relations
- Israel reveals Spanish man, 46, is among the hundreds of hostages taken by Hamas
