In addition, the Commission has asked X for access to some of its commercial APIs to dig into its content moderation practices.
Continuing its formal investigation into X, the European Commission has ordered the social media platform to provide internal documents on its recommender systems while preserving information on any changes to its design and functioning until the end of the year.
In late 2023, the EU launched a probe into X, formerly known as Twitter, to assess whether the platform – designated as a ‘very large online platform’ (VLOP) – violated the Digital Services Act (DSA), particularly in areas linked to risk management, content moderation, dark patterns, advertising transparency and data access for researchers.
In addition, the investigation is also looking into the measures X takes to combat information manipulation on its services, especially in the context of its Community Notes feature and the dissemination of material related to Israel’s war in Palestine.
Today’s (17 January) announcement requires X to provide the requested internal documents on its recommender system and any recent changes made to it by 15 February.
Moreover, the Commission has also requested the platform for access to some of its commercial APIs (application programming interfaces) that will allow authorities to conduct direct fact-finding on content moderation and virality of accounts.
“Today we are taking further steps to shed light on the compliance of X’s recommender systems with the obligations under the DSA,” said the Commission’s executive VP for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, Henna Virkkunen.
“We are committed to ensuring that every platform operating in the EU respects our legislation, which aims to make the online environment fair, safe and democratic for all European citizens.”
In December 2023, X became the first VLOP to face formal proceedings by the EU for allegedly not complying with the DSA – legislation that came into force earlier that year.
According to its preliminary findings from the investigation, the EU said that X is in breach of the DSA in a number of areas, including advertising transparency and providing data access to researchers.
In addition, the Commission also claimed that X designs and operates its blue verification checkmarks in a way that does not correspond to industry practice and “deceives” users.
Last year, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission concluded legal proceedings against X after the platform agreed to suspend the processing EU users’ data to train its AI chatbot Grok, permanently.
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