Twitter has failed to complete its first European Union test of how it deals with obfuscation just months before the bloc’s main content law – the Digital Services Act – and its potentially sweeping fines start to apply.
Dozens of tech companies, including major social media companies such as Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and TikTok, were asked to give a report this month on how they comply with the EU’s anti-disinformation charter, the 2022 Code of Practice on Disinformation, in June. 2022. Tech companies were asked to provide hundreds of detailed numbers and data on how to combat fraud and foreign interference on their platforms.
But according to the European Commission, Elon Musk’s social network Twitter was the only tech company to provide an incomplete report, citing a paucity of data and no information on what plans to cooperate with fact-checkers.
“I am disappointed that Twitter’s report lags behind others,” European Commission Vice President for Values Vera Jurova said in a statement. “I expect a more serious commitment to their obligations arising from the Code.”
Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The code is optional. But by complying, social media companies can ease some of their compliance obligations under the Digital Services Act (DSA) and avoid fines of up to 6 percent of their global revenue if they flout the standards. Big tech platforms with more than 45 million users in the EU will start facing scrutiny as soon as September 2023, and Twitter is expected to fall under this category.
The information the social media firms were asked to provide included: how they detect and stop coordinated foreign manipulation campaigns; how they cut advertising money for campaign actors; How they label political ads and allow researchers to access their data. All data had to be broken down for each of the 27 EU countries.
Twitter is also expected to reduce free access to data for researchers later Thursday. Since tech mogul Musk bought Twitter in late October 2022, many Twitter employees working on trust and security issues have either been fired or left the company.
“It is no surprise that the degree of quality var[ies] According to the resources the organizations have allocated to the project,” Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said in a statement.
Report on the Revised Charter on Disinformation of the EU Release is expected later Thursday. More than 30 platforms and organizations have signed the initiative. The report will come next July.