A top European Union official has said that Twitter “huge work aheadto prepare for the bloc’s strict new rules for online platforms. Thierry Breton, the commissioner responsible for implementing the upcoming Digital Services Act (DSA), posted a short video clip of a meeting with CEO Elon Musk, saying he welcomed Musk’s intention to get Twitter 2.0 ready for the DSA .
According to the Financial times, Breton said Twitter needed to make some changes to meet the DSA’s requirements. It will have to “aggressively” tackle disinformation, submit to an audit, provide clear criteria about which users are at risk of being banned, and carefully consider how it will lift bans in the future. Breton posted a full “DSA checklist”, through his Mastodon accountcontaining the rules that he believes Twitter will have to adhere to.
Failure to comply with the DSA could lead to an EU-wide ban or fines of up to 6 percent of global sales when it comes into effect. Politics reports may not happen until early 2024. Musk, for his part, is said to have called the DSA “very sensible” in his meeting with the commissioner. It’s at least the second time Musk has spoken with Breton after the EU official posted a video of the pair saying they agreed on the DSA in May.
However, some legal experts have wondered whether Twitter will have to adhere to the strictest rules of the DSA. Twitter has yet to be officially classified as a “very large online platform”, or VLOP, which carries greater obligations for platforms with at least 45 million users in the EU. A spokesman for the European Commission recently refused Confirm to TechCrunch or Twitter is classified as VLOP.
The meeting between Breton and Musk comes as Twitter has made it public his approach to moderation under his new owner. In a blog post titled “Twitter 2.0: Our Continued Commitment to the Public Conversation,” the social media network said that while “none of our policies have changed,” it would be more willing to experiment in the future. “We believe this open and transparent approach to innovation is healthy because it allows us to move faster and collect user feedback in real time,” the post reads.
But according to Twitter’s own support pages, it made at least one change to its moderation policy under Musk: ending enforcement of its covid disinformation policy. That has angered at least one EU official, European Commission Vice-President for Values and Transparency Věra Jourová, who told Politics that into [her] look, Twitter is now jumping to the forefront of regulators.” It suggests that Twitter is now in the regulator’s crosshairs as it prepares to enforce the DSA.
With Twitter’s workforce undergoing a significant downsizing following the purchase of Musk, the Financial times reports that EU officials are asking questions about its ability to comply with its strict regulations in the future.
