The EU has warned Elon Musk’s X that it could face huge fines after regulators said its blue tick system for users is misleading and violates its long-standing social media rules.
The European Commission announced the preliminary results of an investigation, saying the platform failed to comply with the Digital Services Act. X faces fines of up to 6% of its global turnover if the preliminary findings are confirmed.
The EU’s executive arm said X had broken the law in three areas: misleading users by giving blue ticks (previously a way of signalling an account’s trustworthiness) to untrustworthy accounts; failing to give researchers access to publicly available data such as posts; and running an inadequate advertising library, which prevents researchers from examining ads, including deliberately misleading ones, on the platform.
Thierry Breton, a key figure behind the law as EU commissioner for the internal market, said: “In the past, blue ticks used to mean reliable sources of information. Now, with X, our preliminary view is that they mislead users and breach the DSA.”
Breton said X had the right to respond, but “if our opinion is confirmed, we will impose fines and demand significant changes.”
The commission is continuing to investigate whether X has breached the DSA by failing to tackle illegal content and misinformation on the platform. Friday’s announcement represents the commission’s first preliminary findings against a company under the DSA. It has also opened proceedings under the act against TikTok and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta.
X has not released formal financial figures under Musk’s ownership. But the Tesla CEO has admitted that the company’s advertising revenue, historically its main source of income, has fallen substantially since he bought it in 2022 and has said it is on track for revenue of $3 billion in 2023.
X introduced the paid blue ticks as part of a revamp of its premium subscription service, which costs €8 a month in the EU and which Brussels says has been abused by bad actors.
“There is evidence of motivated malicious actors abusing the ‘verified account’ to deceive users,” the commission said.
Musk’s first attempt to revamp the premium service in 2022 resulted in a flurry of imposter accounts, as pranksters took advantage of the change to buy a blue tick and impersonate companies like Nintendo and Tesla, as well as public figures like the Pope and George W. Bush.
X has been contacted for comment.
