The demand marks an escalation from earlier this week, when Breton sent a warning letter to X owner Elon Musk, pressing him on whether the platform was being used to disseminate “illegal content and disinformation” related to the Hamas attacks against Israel.
“The #DSA is here to protect both freedom of expression & our democracies — including in times of crisis,” Breton wrote on X on Thursday.
The European Union’s law, which came into force for large platforms in August, could pose a significant check against Musk and the hands-off approach he has taken to policing misinformation and other harmful content on X. The E.U. has built a reputation as Silicon Valley’s top cop, and X’s handling of terrorist content and other posts related to the war poses an early test of how the law may be enforced.
Meanwhile, Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of the social media giant nearly a year ago has transformed the site, as it restored thousands of previously banned accounts and relaxed some rules on the site — attempting to make good on a vow from Musk to make the platform a haven free speech. Advertisers have fled, concerned about hateful content surging on the site.
X did not respond to a request for comment.
In a response to Breton, X CEO Linda Yaccarino wrote that the company had removed or labeled tens of thousands of posts, and applied crowdsourced fact checks, called Community Notes, to thousands of other posts. She also said that the company assembled a leadership group to handle “crisis response” to the war, and she shared details about the company’s policies and their enforcement. She said X has identified and removed hundreds of Hamas-affiliated accounts since the start of the war, and it has also responded to more than 80 take down requests in the E.U. in a “diligent and objective manner.”
“X is committed to transparency, safety and the successful implementation of the DSA and will continue to take all appropriate steps to that end,” she wrote, according to a tweet.
The E.U.’s decision to open the probe signals that Breton found the company’s response to his Tuesday letter lacking. Hours before announcing the probe, Breton said that the DSA enforcement team was analyzing Musk’s response and determining next steps.
Breton’s Tuesday letter said the European Commission had “indications” that the platform was being used to disseminate illegal content. He told Musk that the company needed to be transparent about what content was permitted under its rules and that the company needed to be timely in taking action when it receives notices of illegal content in the E.U.
Breton also told the company it needed “proportionate and effective mitigation measures to tackle the risks to public security and civic discourse stemming from disinformation.” He cited media reports that repurposed old images of unrelated conflicts and footage from video games were being used to mislead the public about the Israel-Gaza war.
Musk responded publicly to Breton in a post on X on Tuesday.
“Our policy is that everything is open source and transparent, an approach that I know the E.U. supports,” he said. “Please list the violations you allude to on , so that the public can see them. Merci beaucoup.”
Amid a surge of war-related misinformation, Musk himself has personally recommended that users follow accounts notorious for promoting falsehoods. On Sunday morning, he told his 150 million followers to get updates about the war in real time from a pair of accounts that previously spread false claims of an explosion near the White House. He deleted the tweet after it had been viewed 11 million times in three hours.
Breton sent warnings to multiple social media companies about their handling of illegal content and disinformation related to the Hamas attack on Israel under the Digital Services Act.
On Thursday, he sent a letter to TikTok chief executive Shou Zi Chew, saying that the company has a “particular obligation” to protect children and teenagers using the social network from “violent content depicting hostage taking and other graphic videos.” In a Wednesday letter to Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg, Breton asked him to be “very vigilant to ensure strict compliance with the DSA rules.”
In June, Breton traveled to X’s headquarters in San Francisco to test whether the company was prepared for its obligations under the DSA. Breton said he had a “very good” meeting with Musk and Twitter chief executive Linda Yaccarino, but that the test showed the company still had work to do before enforcement began.
And shortly after Musk took over X, the world’s richest man tweeted: “The bird is freed.” Within hours, Breton responded that in Europe, “the bird will fly by our rules.”
