EU regulators take a hard look at Elon Musk and X

Under the Digital Services Act, Elon Musk and his social media platform, X, could face heavy penalties should investigators for the European Union find that he manipulated the site’s algorithm in order to influence voters. The DSA was adopted in 2022 to prevent disinformation and other illegal activities online.

In July, the European Union found that X had violated multiple tenets of the DSA by not providing access to data to researchers, failure to complay with advertising-transparency requirements, and selling access to its “blue check” verification system in a way that allowed fraudsters to impersonate celebrities and public officials. 

On Thursday, Musk livestreamed a conversation with Alice Weidel, the leader of the nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD), and amplified the party’s message ahead of February’s elections. As Musk has grown more politically active, there is growing concern that X could manipulate its algorithm to boost the visibility of the interview and offer Weidel an unfair advantage, which would violate the DSA, as well as the integrity of Germany’s approaching election. 

“If an online platform is posing a systemic risk to electoral integrity and public discourse in the EU, the DSA should immediately kick in through its risk-assessment and -mitigation framework,” Eliska Pirkova, a senior policy analyst with the digital rights group Access Now, told DW. 

‘Visibility and interaction’

A recent study by Queensland Universityfound that the X algorithm might have been tweaked in summer 2024 to boost Musk’s posts at the time he endorsed Donald Trump for US president. The study concluded that the possibility of algorithmic prioritization or bias has “broader implications for understanding how platform algorithms may shape public discourse by influencing which voices and content receive heightened visibility and interaction.” 

If the European Union finds that the X algorithm has been manipulated to push content endorsed by Musk, it can impose hefty fines on the platform — up to 6% of its global revenue — and even block the site across the 27 member states.

“They can kick him out of the single European market, if he keeps not complying with the rules,” Andrea Renda, who leads the Global Governance, Regulation, Innovation and the Digital Economy unit at the Centre for European Policy Studies, told DW. “The concern is that, as a platform owner, he might be creating a privileged channel for the amplification of certain content, including hate speech and disinformation,” Renda said. “This is what platforms are not supposed to do under DSA.” 

A long fight

The European Union can request the details of X’s algorithm, which can be studied by vetted researchers under the data-access framework, and seek internal correspondence from the company for the ongoing investigations.

Upon request from the European Commission, large platforms such as X “have to be able to explain the design, the logic, the functioning and the testing of their algorithmic systems, including their recommender systems,” Pirkova said, referring to the organized news feeds on individual timelines based on personal interests. 

Should Musk refuse to cooperate, gaining access to X’s internal data would likely prove to be a long drawn-out process, and one in which the European Union could have little leverage. Blocking X within the EU would be seen as an extreme measure, and even a fine of tens of millions of euros is unlikely to deter a man of such means.

“Musk is not acting as a purely rational economic actor,” Felix Kaarte, a senior fellow at Germany’s Mercator Foundation, told DW. “His actions appear to be politically motivated, making it unlikely that the mere threat of fines or legal repercussions would deter him.”

Those concerned that Musk and X might pose a threat to the integrity of elections within the European Union are encouraging the EU to prepare for a long fight on multiple fronts.

“The response should not exclusively rely on the DSA,” Renda said. “EU leaders should also act at the political level, as Elon Musk has an unprecedented political, informational and economic power, which cannot be used as a means of foreign interference with the political process.” 

Edited by: M Gagnon