A public dispute between Elon Musk and the EU has sharpened concerns in Europe about its ability to wield power over the sprawling social media platform X at a time when disinformation and deepfakes have helped to fuel political discord and an outbreak of UK rioting.
Europe has taken a tougher approach to regulating digital platforms than the US, but Musk’s acquisition of X, then called Twitter, almost two years ago has brought the issue into greater focus after he slashed its moderators, restored previously banned accounts and increased his own outspoken posts.
At the same time, the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) brought the bloc fresh powers to enforce sweeping rules in areas such as disinformation and advertising, including a penalty that one official who worked on the rules called a “nuclear weapon”: removing access to a social network across the region.