The European Union has accepted a plan by Elon Musk's X social media platform to correct digital content violations that led to a 120-million-euro ($138-million) fine. The European Commission imposed the penalty in December 2025 for breaching its transparency obligation, the deceptive design of its 'blue checkmark' for supposedly verified accounts, and its failure to provide access to public data for researchers. This fine was the first ever under the bloc's landmark Digital Services Act (DSA), which has faced fierce criticism in the United States, including claims that it allows censorship.
X proposed measures that would boost access by researchers, including to ad content, and respond on a timely basis. The platform has already changed its blue checkmarks from'verified' to 'premium' users. Thomas Regnier, the European Commission's spokesman on digital issues, stated that the measures are 'an important step in the right direction' and will enable more transparency into X's systems and the impact on users.
X has six months to implement the measures, which will be subject to an external and independent audit. The agreement on the measures does not halt an appeal to the fine that X filed in February. The US tech industry and the Trump administration have criticized European efforts to regulate the sector, with US President Donald Trump calling the X fine censorship. A few weeks later, the US State Department announced sanctions on five individuals, including former EU commissioner Thierry Breton.
The European Commission has not fully completed the probe it opened in 2023 into X. It also opened an investigation at the start of the year over AI chatbot Grok's generation of sexualized deepfake images of women and minors. The regulatory actions and responses highlight the ongoing tensions between European and US approaches to digital regulation and the significant implications for global tech companies.
