After two years of investigation, the European Commission published on Friday, December 5, the first results of its probe into Elon Musk’s X platform and decided to impose a €120 million fine. According to the European Union’s executive arm, X violated several rules of the Digital Services Act (DSA). The breaches include the misleading design of its “blue checkmark” verification badge, a lack of transparency in its advertising repository and failure to provide researchers access to public data.

While the fine may seem modest, “it is proportionate to the punished offenses,” said a European official. “The fine costs X much more than it would have if they had complied with the rules.” According to the official, “in the current geopolitical context, Brussels is demonstrating that it is taking action and does not intend to give up its digital regulations.” Since Donald Trump’s return to the White House, and amid efforts to protect American tech giants, the US administration has steadily increased pressure on Brussels to revise or even shelve the DSA, which was adopted in 2022.

You have 75.61% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.