EU Threatens To Ban Twitter Bloc-Wide Unless Musk Follows New Moderation Rules - Reports

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 01st December, 2022) The European Union has threatened to ban Twitter on the bloc's territory if the social network's new owner, billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, does not abide by new strict content moderation rules, the Financial Times reported Wednesday citing sources.

The warning came from European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton during his video call with Musk earlier in the day, people with knowledge of the conversation told the newspaper.

Breton, who is in charge of implementing the EU's digital rules, urged Musk to adhere to a checklist of rules, including ditching an "arbitrary" approach to reinstating banned users, pursuing disinformation "aggressively" and agreeing to an "extensive independent audit" of the social network by 2023, according to the report.

Unless Twitter follows the EU's new Digital Services Act, it could face a Europe-wide ban or fines of up to 6% of global turnover, the report said.

Meanwhile, Musk considers the new legislation "very sensible" and that it should be applied everywhere in the world, sources said.

US company Twitter Inc. was founded in 2006. The company's main product is a social network for exchanging short messages. In late October, Musk bought the company for $44 billion. In November, a little over a week after taking over, Musk started laying off the company's workers in a bid to place Twitter "on a healthy path," which raised a wave of public criticism. On November 20, Twitter also unblocked Donald Trump's account, banned after the US Capitol attack on January 6, 2021, as the majority of participants in a survey conducted by Musk voted in favor of the measure.