Musk's X charged with deceiving users via blue checkmark, risks fine
The Hindu
EU regulators find Elon Musk's X in breach of online content rules, facing fines and changes in operations.
Elon Musk's social media company X breached EU online content rules and its blue checkmark deceives users, EU tech regulators ruled on Friday in a finding that could lead to a hefty fine and significant changes in how it operates.
The charges by the European Commission, the first issued under the Digital Services Act (DSA), follow a seven-month long investigation. The new rules require very large online platforms and search engines to do more to tackle illegal content and risks to public security.
The EU executive's preliminary findings or charges sent to X targeted the company's so-called dark patterns that shape user behaviour, its advertising transparency and data access for researchers.
It said X's verified accounts which carry a blue checkmark do not correspond to industry practice and negatively affect users' ability to make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of the accounts they interact with.
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After buying the platform then known as Twitter in 2022, Musk altered the use of the blue checkmark, which previously indicated that an account belonged to a public figure whose identity was verified but was changed to indicate it belonged to a paid subscriber.
The commission said X had also failed to comply with a DSA requirement to provide searchable and reliable information about advertisements in a library for easy access.