The EU opens an investigation into X over hosting disinformation tied to Hamas' Israel attack and sends X a formal request for information under the DSA
'In this particular case, the Commission services are investigating X's compliance with the #DSA, including with regard to its policies and practices regarding notices on illegal content, complaint handling, risk assessment and measures to mitigate the risks identified.' … Claes de Vreese / @claesdevreese@mastodon.social : The European Commission is “investigating X's compliance with the DSA, including with regard to its policies and practices regarding notices on illegal content, complaint handling, risk assessment.” — Responses required by the of the month. Late or insufficient answers can lead to penalties. … Bluesky: JimboChill / @jimbochill.bsky.social : Yeah that's like $100 at this point. X: Thierry Breton / @thierrybreton : #TikTok has a particular obligation to protect children & teenagers from violent content & terrorist propaganda —as well as death challenges & potentially life-threatening content. #DSA sets out very clear obligations TikTok must comply with. Letter to TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew⤵️ [image] Thierry Breton / @thierrybreton : The #DSA is here to protect both freedom of expression & our democracies — including in times of crisis. We have sent @X a formal request for information, a first step in our investigation to determine compliance with the DSA. https://ec.europa.eu/... Věra Jourová / @verajourova : Illegal content and terrorist propaganda has no place in the EU, neither offline nor online. The Commission has a duty to vigorously enforce the #DSA and this formal request for information is a step to fully understand what measures @X is taking to ensure online safety. Glenn Greenwald / @ggreenwald : EU officials continue to directly threaten X (along with other Big Tech platforms) that either they start immediately censoring more political speech that EU officials regard as false or dangerous, or they will suffer severe punishment under the EU's new censorship law: Daphne Keller / @daphnehk : In a way we should be relieved that @ThierryBreton said the quiet part out loud so quickly. Other countries considering emulating the DSA should consider whether they want to hand this same authority to restrict lawful speech to their own governments. 2/ Erin Woo / @erinkwoo : New: The European Commission is investigating X's compliance with the DSA over its content moderation policies. It comes as X has slashed its capabilities for responding to misinformation. Failure to comply could result in fines of up to 6% of X's revenue. https://www.theinformation.com/ ... Preston Byrne / @prestonjbyrne : @ThierryBreton @X The DSA is a censorship and content takedown law. Its sole purpose is to censor content European governments dislike. To tell your constituents that this regime protects “freedom of expression” is the worst kind of Orwellian doublespeak. Daphne Keller / @daphnehk : When the EU tells platforms they have a legal obligation to “mitigate harms,” does that just mean “take down lawful but harmful content”? This letter from @ThierryBreton seems like a big YES. Regulators can tell platforms what legal material to remove. 1/ https://twitter.com/... Ingrid / @ingridlunden : Why does this matter? A formal investigation will give us all a better idea of how ‘X’ is used and abused: since Musk took Twitter private, there is a lot less transparency around it. We use it in a dark tunnel bored by Elon. Matt Taibbi / @mtaibbi : You don't “protect freedom of expression” by allowing unaccountable bureaucrats to mandate removal of content. You have no idea what freedom of expression is. https://www.racket.news/... Daphne Keller / @daphnehk : @ThierryBreton If this letter were really just telling Meta to take down ILLEGAL content, it would have used that word half a dozen more times, instead of saying things like “fake.” 3/3 Jason Kint / @jason_kint : I guess that answers the question of what the enforcement team thought of Team Elon's reply. [image] Scott Nover / @scottnover : As bad as Twitter is at stopping misinformation—the point of my last piece—we should be very worried when governments start deciding what's “misinformation” and what isn't. Lisa O'Carroll / @lisaocarroll : BREAKING: The EU sends 2nd missive to X re alleged “spreading of terrorist and violent content and hate speech” Thierry Breton makes formal demand for fresh info about its ability to comply with new laws. Giving it two deadlines 18 Oct and 31 Oct https://ec.europa.eu/... Forums: r/inthenews : Elon Musk's X faces E.U. probe over handling of Israel-Gaza war
Financial TimesJavier Espinoza
Context & Ripple Effects
This formal information request escalates a regulator’s warning that X could face DSA penalties over Israel-Hamas war content, issued a day earlier in the EU’s warning to X on illegal content and disinformation. It shifts the issue from public pressure to an evidence-gathering process focused on notices, complaints, risk assessment and mitigation.
The move also sits alongside the Commission’s parallel call for Meta to be vigilant about war-related disinformation, indicating that the enforcement concern is about platform safeguards rather than one company’s speech policy alone.
First-order effects
X must document how its content-moderation, illegal-content notice, complaint-handling and risk-mitigation systems operate under the DSA; incomplete responses can deepen its regulatory exposure.
The Commission gains a formal record on which to assess whether X’s operational controls meet the DSA’s requirements during a fast-moving information crisis.
Second-order effects
Other large platforms face pressure to preserve evidence and demonstrate comparable crisis-response processes, especially after the regulator’s contemporaneous request for Meta to remove war-related disinformation.
Content-moderation decisions become more consequential operationally: platform policies, user-reporting flows and enforcement records can each become inputs to a regulatory case.
Third-order effects
The case points toward distribution-layer liability becoming practical enforcement: platforms may be judged not only on published rules, but on whether their systems can identify, process and mitigate systemic content risks.
If sustained, this approach gives the DSA a role as a continuing audit framework for major platforms, with later action against X over its paid verification design showing that scrutiny can extend beyond a single crisis topic.
The trend: European platform governance is moving from voluntary assurances toward evidence-based scrutiny of the systems that shape content distribution and user trust.
The European Commission is “investigating X's compliance with the DSA, including with regard to its policies and practices regarding notices on illegal content, complaint handling, risk assessment.” — Responses required by the of the month. Late or insufficient answers can lea…
#TikTok has a particular obligation to protect children & teenagers from violent content & terrorist propaganda —as well as death challenges & potentially life-threatening content. #DSA sets out very clear obligations TikTok must comply with. Letter to TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew⤵️ […
The #DSA is here to protect both freedom of expression & our democracies — including in times of crisis. We have sent @X a formal request for information, a first step in our investigation to determine compliance with the DSA. https://ec.europa.eu/...
Illegal content and terrorist propaganda has no place in the EU, neither offline nor online. The Commission has a duty to vigorously enforce the #DSA and this formal request for information is a step to fully understand what measures @X is taking to ensure online safety.
Why does this matter? A formal investigation will give us all a better idea of how ‘X’ is used and abused: since Musk took Twitter private, there is a lot less transparency around it. We use it in a dark tunnel bored by Elon.
@ThierryBreton @X The DSA is a censorship and content takedown law. Its sole purpose is to censor content European governments dislike. To tell your constituents that this regime protects “freedom of expression” is the worst kind of Orwellian doublespeak.
EU officials continue to directly threaten X (along with other Big Tech platforms) that either they start immediately censoring more political speech that EU officials regard as false or dangerous, or they will suffer severe punishment under the EU's new censorship law:
When the EU tells platforms they have a legal obligation to “mitigate harms,” does that just mean “take down lawful but harmful content”? This letter from @ThierryBreton seems like a big YES. Regulators can tell platforms what legal material to remove. 1/ https://twitter.com/...
In a way we should be relieved that @ThierryBreton said the quiet part out loud so quickly. Other countries considering emulating the DSA should consider whether they want to hand this same authority to restrict lawful speech to their own governments. 2/
You don't “protect freedom of expression” by allowing unaccountable bureaucrats to mandate removal of content. You have no idea what freedom of expression is. https://www.racket.news/...
@ThierryBreton If this letter were really just telling Meta to take down ILLEGAL content, it would have used that word half a dozen more times, instead of saying things like “fake.” 3/3
BREAKING: The EU sends 2nd missive to X re alleged “spreading of terrorist and violent content and hate speech” Thierry Breton makes formal demand for fresh info about its ability to comply with new laws. Giving it two deadlines 18 Oct and 31 Oct https://ec.europa.eu/...
New: The European Commission is investigating X's compliance with the DSA over its content moderation policies. It comes as X has slashed its capabilities for responding to misinformation. Failure to comply could result in fines of up to 6% of X's revenue. https://www.theinformat…
As bad as Twitter is at stopping misinformation—the point of my last piece—we should be very worried when governments start deciding what's “misinformation” and what isn't.
In the past couple of days, we've seen an increase in daily active users on @X in the conflict area, plus there have been more than 50 million posts globally focusing on the weekend's terrorist attack on Israel by Hamas. As the events continue to unfold rapidly, a cross-company l…
Everyday we're reminded of our global responsibility to protect the public conversation by ensuring everyone has access to real-time information and safeguarding the platform for all our users. In response to the recent terrorist attack on Israel by Hamas, we've redistributed...
Following the terrorist attacks by Hamas against 🇮🇱, we have indications of X/Twitter being used to disseminate illegal content & disinformation in the EU. Urgent letter to @elonmusk on #DSA obligations ⤵️ [image]
@ThierryBreton Our policy is that everything is open source and transparent, an approach that I know the EU supports. Please list the violations you allude to on 𝕏, so that that the public can see them. Merci beaucoup.
@elonmusk Vu, merci. You are well aware of your users' — and authorities'— reports on fake content and glorification of violence. Up to you to demonstrate that you walk the talk. My team remains at your disposal to ensure DSA compliance, which the EU will continue to enforce rigo…
We have received the reply by @X to our letter raising concerns about the spread of illegal content and disinformation related to the Hamas terrorist attack against Israel. The #DSA enforcement team will analyse the reply and decide on next steps.
X has spent the past 12 hours systemically removing all proof of Palestinian terrorist atrocities committed on children, women, the elderly, and the men. A fraction of the proof remains. And not just individual posts — but full accounts gone. Why is X doing this. The victims...
“Why is X doing this?” Probably because the European Commission is ordering them to, as @ThierryBreton made clear in his post on Monday. People seeing Hamas atrocities threatens social order in Europe so it must be suppressed.
A few remarks : - @ThierryBreton wrongly sent his letter to @elonmusk (the old boys club mentality ?). @lindayaX replies, as she should have been the rightful recipient as the company's CEO. Amen to that. - Breton says that X must remove disinformation, Linda Yacarino replies in.…
Linda Yaccarino responded to Thierry Breton's letter here: (Elon Musk responded yesterday via this platform, asking for more information and demanding that Breton post alleged violations publicly on X.)
This is a misunderstanding of how to use Twitter effectively. You can still get feeds of arbitrarily high quality on any topic, including breaking news, but it requires using the lists feature. That has never been adequately promoted or supported, but it's at everyone's disposal
A lot of people who spent the Trump years cheerleading for critical thinking, fact-checking and fighting disinformation are now leaving in a huff now that this site is not ideologically homogeneous instead of putting their principles into action. Sad!
“X users were presented with video game footage passed off as footage of a Hamas attack, images of fireworks in Algeria presented as Israeli strikes on Hamas & old video from the Syrian civil war repurposed to look like it was taken this weekend” https://www.wired.com/...
Things just got (appropriately) real for Elon in his posture on the new DSA. “I urge you to ensure a prompt, accurate and complete response to this request within the next 24 hours. We will include your answer in our assessment file on your compliance with the DSA.”
A long overdue first step by @ThierryBreton Under Musk, X has become a swamp of disinformation..including from the owner of the platform. EU laws must apply & if not enough, X should be regulated until it cleans up its act!
I have seen a lot of disinfo on X - my fab colleague @Shayan86 is doing a good job of highlighting the fakes he has been able to verify but ultimately it's X's job, not his