Bloomberg, Reuters and other foreign media reports say that on December 5 local time, after a two-year investigation, the European Commission finally determined that the social platform X, owned by American billionaire Musk, did not comply with the requirements of the Digital Services Act (DSA), and issued a fine of 120 million euros (approximately 988 million yuan at the current exchange rate).
According to the introduction, the EU's Digital Services Act (DSA) came into effect in 2023 and is considered one of the strictest internet regulatory laws in the world. The act requires large online platforms to take legal responsibility for illegal content, false information, and algorithmic transparency. If companies fail to comply with relevant regulations, they may face fines of up to 6% of their global annual revenue.
Since December 2023, the EU has accused X platform of using the blue verification mark to deceive users and announced an investigation against it based on the DSA. On December 5, after two years of investigation, the European Commission stated in a statement that the paid "blue badge" symbol of the X platform misled users, and the platform hindered researchers from accessing data and failed to establish a compliant advertising database.
Bloomberg analysis said that the fine of 120 million euros is far lower than the maximum penalty under the law. Compared to Musk's net worth of 467 billion US dollars, it is just "a drop in the ocean". However, this move will certainly escalate the tensions between the EU and the White House.
Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice President of the European Commission in charge of digital technology, told Reuters on December 5 that the moderate fine imposed on X was appropriate, calculated based on the nature of its violations, the severity of the impact on EU users, and the duration of the violations.
"We are not aiming to issue the highest possible fines. We are to ensure our digital regulations are enforced. If you comply with our rules, you won't be fined. It's that simple," said Virkkunen.
Before the EU officially announced this decision, US Vice President Vance had already expressed on the social platform X: "There are rumors that the European Commission will impose a fine of several hundred million dollars on X because the company did not conduct censorship. The EU should support freedom of speech, rather than attack American companies for some garbage reasons."
Previously, the EU had, in April of this year, imposed fines of 500 million euros and 200 million euros on the American tech giants Apple and Meta based on another law aimed at combating the abuse of market dominance by tech giants, the Digital Markets Act. Earlier, the EU had repeatedly launched antitrust investigations against Google and accumulated fines totaling 8.25 billion euros.
Over the past few months, US President Trump has repeatedly publicly criticized the EU's penalties as "unfair" and called them "discriminatory actions" against American companies. Trump also threatened to impose retaliatory tariffs on the EU.
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Original: toutiao.com/article/7580355192508416554/
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