EU Fines X €120 Million for Violating Online Content Rules While TikTok Avoids Penalty
GeokHub
Contributing Writer
BRUSSELS — Dec 5 (GeokHub) The European Commission has imposed a €120 million fine on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), concluding it breached new EU rules designed to police online content and digital transparency. The decision marks the first major enforcement action under the bloc’s landmark online-platform legislation.
According to regulators, X violated several obligations: its “blue checkmark” verification badge — once used to denote trusted or verified accounts — was redesigned in a way deemed misleading, since users could obtain it for payment without sufficient identity verification. This, the Commission argues, undermines user trust and opens the door to impersonation and scams.
In addition, X failed to maintain adequate transparency around advertisements — including disclosure of who paid for ads and who they targeted — and blocked access to public data from researchers, thwarting efforts to monitor and analyse content risks.
At the same time, another popular platform under review, TikTok, avoided a fine by committing to improve its ad-transparency practices. EU regulators accepted the company’s assurances to upgrade its advertising-repository and reporting systems.
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