DSA: EU Commission imposes 120 million euro fine on X
Due to several violations of the Digital Services Act, the European Commission has imposed a first fine on Elon Musk's platform X.
The Vice-President of the EU Commission, Henna Virkkunen, is responsible for enforcing the DSA.
(Image: Aurore Martignoni/EU-Kommission)
The US platform X must pay a fine of 120 million euros for violations of the European Digital Services Act (DSA). This was announced by the EU Commission on Friday afternoon in Brussels. It is the first DSA fine imposed by the Commission. X belongs to billionaire Elon Musk.
The decision concerns three provisions of the DSA that X has allegedly violated, according to the Commission. X is said to have deceived users with the blue checkmark, which marked verified accounts on the predecessor platform Twitter, and to have violated transparency regulations for advertising. Furthermore, X has failed to fulfill its obligation to grant researchers access to platform data.
"Deception of users"
"The deception of users with blue checkmarks, the concealment of information about ads, and the exclusion of researchers have no place in the EU," emphasized the responsible EU Commissioner Vice-President Henna Virkkunen.
The Commission is also setting deadlines of up to 90 working days for X, within which the company must take measures and explain how it will prevent the identified violations in the future.
The Commission initiated the proceedings against X in December 2023, shortly after the DSA came into force. Meanwhile, further investigations are ongoing, including regarding content moderation on the platform. These are not yet concluded.
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Further investigations
This decision concerned exclusively transparency issues, a Commission spokesperson said on Friday afternoon in Brussels. The question whether X complies with applicable EU law in the area of content moderation remains open.
The fine imposed on Friday had already been foreshadowed. It is comparatively moderate, especially considering speculation that the EU fine could amount to more than one billion US dollars. According to the EU's decision, the fine consists of three parts: 45 million euros for the verification checkmarks, 40 million euros for the lack of data access for researchers, and 35 million euros for the lack of transparency in advertising.
Since EU fines must be proportionate to the offense, the Commission could also impose significantly higher fines in further decisions. For the calculation, the "entire corporate structure" of X was considered, the spokesperson explained.
(dahe)
