Twitter withdraws from disinformation crusade in Europe – POLITICO

Twitter is about to pull out of one of the European Union’s efforts to stamp out misinformation.

In the coming days, the social media giant, which is owned by Elon Musk, is expected to end its participation in the bloc’s disinformation code of practice, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity. to talk to discuss internal discussions between the company and the European Commission.

The code of practice is a voluntary regulation that was revamped last year and includes obligations for companies like Twitter, Meta and Alphabet to track political advertising, stop the monetization of misinformation and provide better access to these platforms to foreigners. Although not mandatory, companies’ participation in the code has been designed to help offset some of those companies’ obligations under the separate and mandatory Digital Services Act – new social media rules that include fines of up to 6% of a company’s annual turnover.

A Commission spokesperson said that since the code of practice is voluntary, it was up to individual companies to determine whether they would participate. So far, the spokesperson added, Twitter had failed to meet its obligations under the code.

An email sent to Twitter for comment was returned with a poo emoji.

Twitter is expected to officially withdraw as a so-called co-signer of the code of practice next week following Musk’s official signing, according to one of the people who spoke to POLITICO. Since the billionaire fired half of Twitter’s employees last fall, the company has dramatically reduced its participation in EU online content regulation and was the only tech giant to fail to meet its transparency obligations in as part of the quarterly reports required by the code of practice.

EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton has said publicly that he will hold Musk personally responsible for adhering to the block’s content rules, though Twitter’s decision to withdraw from the misinformation code of practice goes directly against it. of this commitment.

This article has been updated with the Commission’s response.