The European Union is preparing to impose serious sanctions against the social network X, owned by Elon Musk, for violating the law on combating illegal content and disinformation, The New York Times reports.
According to sources, the company could be fined more than $1 billion and ordered to change its product, which would be the first case of the Digital Services Act (DSA) being applied.
The investigation began in 2023, and regulators have already found that X broke the law by refusing to provide data for research into the spread of disinformation and by not sufficiently monitoring content.
X is also involved in a second investigation that could lead to additional sanctions. The EU believes that the social network's policies on user-generated content have made the platform a hotbed of hate speech and disinformation.
Company X criticized the regulators' actions, calling them "an unprecedented act of political censorship." Musk had previously said he was prepared to publicly challenge the fines in court.
The EU is considering including the income of Musk's other companies, such as SpaceX, in calculating the fine, which could significantly increase the amount.
Incidentally, in addition to X, the European Union is preparing to fine Meta and Apple for violating the Digital Markets Act (DMA). This indicates the EU's intention to continue to strictly regulate American tech giants, which probably influenced the new high US tariffs against the EU.