By Foo Yun Chee
BRUSSELS, Dec 5 (Reuters) – Elon Musk’s social media company X was fined 120 million euros ($140 million) by EU technology regulators on Friday for violating EU rules on online content, the first sanction under landmark legislation likely to draw the ire of the U.S. government.
Rival TikTok set up a penalty with concessions.
Europe’s crackdown on Big Tech to ensure smaller rivals can compete and consumers have more choice has been criticized by US President Donald Trump’s administration, which it says divides US companies and censors Americans.
The European Commission, the EU’s executive, has said that its laws do not target any nationality and that it is simply defending its digital and democratic standards that usually serve as a reference point for the rest of the world.
EU Technology Chief SAYS FINING IS NOT CENSORSHIP
The EU sanction against X followed a two-year investigation under the bloc’s Digital Services Act (DSA), which requires online platforms to do more to tackle illegal and harmful content.
The EU’s investigation of ByteDance’s social media app TikTok led to accusations in May that the company had breached a DSA requirement to publish an ad repository that would allow researchers and users to detect scam ads.
The head of technology of the European Commission Henna Virkkunen said that the modest fine of X was proportionate and calculated based on the nature of the violations, their gravity in terms of affected EU users and their duration.
“We are not here to impose the highest fines. We are here to ensure that our digital legislation is enforced and if you comply with our rules, you will not get the fine. And it is as simple as that,” he told reporters.
“I think it is very important to emphasize that DSA has nothing to do with censorship,” said Virkkunen.
She said that the following decisions regarding companies that have been accused of breaching the DSA are expected to take less time than the two years for the X case.
“I really expect that we will make the final decisions now more quickly,” she said.
VANCE SAYS EU SHOULD NOT ATTACK AMERICAN COMPANIES
Meta and TikTok were accused of breaching the DSA’s transparency obligations in October while Chinese online marketplace Temu was accused of breaching rules to prevent the sale of illegal products.
X did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. It has between 60 to 90 working days to come up with measures to comply with the DSA, with the time frame depending on the issue.
Before the EU’s decision, US Vice President JD Vance said on X: “Rumors are swirling that the EU commission will fine X hundreds of millions of dollars for not taking part in censorship. The EU should be supporting free speech not attacking American companies over garbage.”
TikTok, which has promised changes to its ad library to be more transparent, urged regulators to apply the law equally and consistently across all platforms.
EU regulators said X’s DSA violations included the misleading design of its blue check mark for verified accounts, the lack of transparency of its advertising repository and its failure to provide researchers with access to public data.
The Commission said that the investigation into the dissemination of illegal content on X and the measures taken to combat the manipulation of information and a separate probe into the design, algorithmic systems and the obligation of TikTok to protect children continues.
DSA fines can be as high as 6% of a company’s annual global revenue.
($1 = 0.8579 euro)
(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee, additional reporting by Philip Blenkinsop; Editing by Toby Chopra)