Regulators discuss size of penalty as X calls punishment “political censorship.”…

European Union regulators are preparing major penalties against X, including a fine that could exceed $1 billion, according to a New York Times report yesterday.

The European Commission determined last year that Elon Musk’s social network violated the Digital Services Act. Regulators are now in the process of determining what punishment to impose.

“The penalties are set to include a fine and demands for product changes,” the NYT report said, attributing the information to “four people with knowledge of the plans.” The penalty is expected to be issued this summer and would be the first one under the new EU law.

“European authorities have been weighing how large a fine to issue X as they consider the risks of further antagonizing [President] Trump amid wider trans-Atlantic disputes over trade, tariffs and the war in Ukraine,” the NYT report said. “The fine could surpass $1 billion, one person said, as regulators seek to make an example of X to deter other companies from violating the law, the Digital Services Act.”

    • FiskFisk33@startrek.websiteEnglish
      33·
      12 hours ago

      Preliminary findings from july

      • First, X designs and operates its interface for the “verified accounts” with the “Blue checkmark” in a way that does not correspond to industry practice and deceives users. Since anyone can subscribe to obtain such a “verified” status, it negatively affects users’ ability to make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of the accounts and the content they interact with. There is evidence of motivated malicious actors abusing the “verified account” to deceive users.
      • Second, X does not comply with the required transparency on advertising, as it does not provide a searchable and reliable advertisement repository, but instead put in place design features and access barriers that make the repository unfit for its transparency purpose towards users. In particular, the design does not allow for the required supervision and research into emerging risks brought about by the distribution of advertising online.
      • Third, X fails to provide access to its public data to researchers in line with the conditions set out in the DSA. In particular, X prohibits eligible researchers from independently accessing its public data, such as by scraping, as stated in its terms of service. In addition, X’s process to grant eligible researchers access to its application programming interface (API) appears to dissuade researchers from carrying out their research projects or leave them with no other choice than to pay disproportionally high fees.

      https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_3761

    • IGuessThisIsMyName@lemmy.worldEnglish
      24·
      18 hours ago

      This would be a fine against X though right rather than Elon himself? Surely the company wouldn’t have that kind of cash available and would need to take drastic action to raise that amount.

      • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.worldEnglish
        189·
        16 hours ago

        rubbing nipples

        Oh, gosh! That sounds SO bad! Go on, tell us in explicit detail all the drastic measures that X would face. Tell us all the pain they would endure! Spare no detail.

        rubs balls

        Yeah…yeah almost there…

    • surewhynotlem@lemmy.worldEnglish
      281·
      20 hours ago

      This. Fines should be percentage of wealth. Otherwise they’re just a sticker price on breaking the law.

      • Mubelotix@jlai.luEnglish
        31·
        10 hours ago

        Nice idea but the state wouldn’t be able to know how much one owns. I am poor, but I have more hidden wealth than declared wealth

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        41·
        12 hours ago

        But $60B is more than Musk bought Twitter for, and there’s no way it increased enough that $60B would be a reasonable percentage of income in any capacity.

        • Blooper@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
          1·
          3 hours ago

          I fully acknowledge your point and don’t disagree. On the other hand, who ever said we have to treat Nazis reasonably?

          • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            3·
            2 hours ago

            Democracy and the rule of law. If you pick and choose groups to treat differently, that’s authoritarianism. Don’t fight authoritarianism with authoritarianism.

  • oxysis@lemm.eeEnglish
    281·
    23 hours ago

    So a slap on the wrist? A significant one sure but just ban them if you want to be serious and make an example out of them

    • mannycalavera@feddit.ukEnglish
      221·
      22 hours ago

      but just ban them if you want to be serious

      But if you ban them you can’t continue to fine them…

      • oxysis@lemm.eeEnglish
        171·
        20 hours ago

        If you want X and other American social media platforms to keep undermining your democracies then sure just fine them. But if you want to get serious then kick them to the fucking curb

        • mannycalavera@feddit.ukEnglish
          2·
          10 hours ago

          But if you want to get serious then kick them to the fucking curb

          Absolutely, but you have to think why the European Union hasn’t done this to date? It’s totally within their gift to say that Twitter is such a dog shit platform that tomorrow it will be blocked, no European company can do business with them. But they don’t. Why is that?

          • jumjummy@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            3 hours ago

            $huck$, I hav€n’t the $light€$t notion a$ to why th€y wouldn’t have tak€n $uch action$.

            It’$ a my$t€ry

      • kautau@lemmy.worldEnglish
        61·
        21 hours ago

        Well then do either one instead of just loudly proclaiming you might do something

  • Little8Lost@lemmy.worldEnglish
    151·
    21 hours ago

    I hope that after the fine goes into action he loses more investors further deminishing his wealth

    does not matter to me if the actual fine is lower when in the end he pays a higher price. (but big numbers are nice so: go europe)

    • wieson@feddit.orgEnglish
      1·
      6 hours ago

      Hopefully it’s a European billion (million, milliarde, billion, billiarde etc) so 10^12