EU Accuses X of Using Deceptive 'Dark Patterns' with Blue Checks

The European Union has criticised Elon Musk's X, formerly known as Twitter, for its blue checkmarks, calling them deceptive. The EU's preliminary findings indicate that the platform lacks transparency and accountability, violating the new social media regulations under the Digital Services Act (DSA). These are the first charges against a tech company since the DSA took effect.

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The European Commission highlighted that X's blue checks could be used by malicious actors to deceive users. Before Musk's acquisition, these checkmarks were verification badges for celebrities and influential accounts. After Musk bought the site in 2022, anyone could get one by paying USD 8 per month. "Since anyone can subscribe to obtain such a 'verified' status it negatively affects users' ability to make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of the accounts and the content they interact with," stated the commission.

Ad Transparency Issues

The commission also accused X of not complying with ad transparency rules. The DSA mandates platforms to publish a database of all digital advertisements, including details like who paid for them and their intended audience. However, X's ad database is neither "searchable" nor "reliable" and has "design features and access barriers" that make it unfit for transparency purposes. This design particularly hinders researchers from investigating emerging risks from online ads.

X has also been charged with blocking data access to researchers. The DSA requires platforms to allow researchers to scrutinise how they operate and how online risks evolve. However, researchers cannot independently access data by scraping it from the site. The process to request access through an interface appears to dissuade researchers or forces them to pay high fees.

Response from Elon Musk

Elon Musk responded combatively to these accusations. He claimed on X that "The European Commission offered X an illegal secret deal: if we quietly censored speech without telling anyone, they would not fine us." He added, "The other platforms accepted that deal. X did not." Musk did not provide further details on this claim.

An email request for comment sent to X resulted in an automated response stating, "Busy now, please check back later." Reports indicate that X's main spokesman left the company in June.

Further Investigations

Regulators are still investigating whether X is doing enough to curb illegal content like hate speech or incitement of terrorism. They are also examining the effectiveness of measures to combat information manipulation, especially through its crowd-sourced Community Notes fact-checking feature.

European Commissioner Thierry Breton commented on the issue, saying, "Back in the day, BlueChecks used to mean trustworthy sources of information. Now with X, our preliminary view is that they deceive users and infringe the DSA."

TikTok, AliExpress, and Meta Platforms (owner of Facebook and Instagram) are also under ongoing DSA investigations. The findings against X are part of a broader investigation into compliance with these new regulations.

X now has an opportunity to respond to these accusations and make necessary changes to comply with the DSA. If the commission remains unsatisfied, it can impose penalties up to 6% of X's annual global revenue and order corrective actions.

These developments mark a significant step in enforcing social media regulations within the EU. The outcomes will likely influence how other platforms operate under similar scrutiny in future.