According to the EU, it is misleading that you can get the blue tick on X by paying

According to preliminary findings, the platform does not meet DSA’s requirements for transparency and access to research.

The European Commission according to the blue tick system used by microblogging platform X – formerly Twitter – actually deceives users and does not comply with the newly introduced Digital Services Act (DSA). In its preliminary findings, the Commission – the executive body of the European Union – found that X deceived users with the way of introducing the blue check mark, since anyone can sign up to obtain such a “verified” status.

On Twitter until November 2022, a blue tick indicated that the platform had taken steps to verify the user’s identity. This has often been used on the accounts of celebrities, politicians, journalists and commentators who could be targeted by impersonators. But shortly after the head of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk, bought the platform in October 2022, he modified the subscription system on the platform, where the blue tick became available without any checks, just by paying money.

EC officials said the move meant users could not make free and informed decisions about the authenticity of accounts and the content they interacted with. There was also evidence that malicious individuals were abusing the ability to become “verified accounts” to trick users. According to a commission official, users are clearly being misled by X’s decision to prioritize content from blue-ticked accounts over replies and lists. “The average user won’t notice that the featured answers are coming from accounts that aren’t necessarily trusted. By purchasing the blue tick, you’re giving priority, and we think that’s misleading.”

With the modified use of the blue tick, X violated the provision of the European Digital Services Act (DSA), which prohibits the so-called the use of dark patterns, i.e. features of the interface of online platforms that aim to manipulate or mislead users into making decisions they do not intend to make, the EC said.

Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said: “In the past, blue ticks were a reliable source of information. Now in the case of X, in our preliminary view, it is misleading users and in breach of the DSA. We also believe that X’s advertising database and researchers its data access conditions are not in line with the DSA’s transparency requirements. X now has the right to defend – but if our opinion is confirmed, we will impose fines and demand significant changes.”

The commission launched an investigation into X in December last year, one of the first proceedings under the newly introduced DSA. The committee also published a preliminary opinion that X did not meet the DSA’s requirements for the transparency of advertising on the platform. Officials said the social media company did not offer a searchable and reliable ad database. Instead, it introduced features and barriers to access that made it ineligible to use the repository for transparency purposes. In addition, X did not provide an API that independent researchers could use to access public data on the platform, but instead set up barriers with “disproportionately high fees,” the commissioner said.

According to the DSA, large technology companies can be fined up to six percent of global turnover – in the case of X, about $2.5 billion. After the publication of the EC’s preliminary findings, X can defend himself by studying the documents in the Commission’s investigation file and responding.

In his response, Musk did not mention at all what his opinion was about the deceptiveness of the blue tick, but instead accused the European Commission of blackmail. “The European Commission offered X an illegal secret deal: if we quietly introduce censorship without telling anyone, we won’t be fined. “The other platforms accepted this deal. X is not.” From this, it is certainly true that the EC’s old expectation for all social platforms is to strengthen moderation (which is not the same as censorship!), on the other hand, Musk has long liked to show himself as a champion of freedom of speech, of course only as long as it allows him to not adversely affected.