Thierry Breton, the European Union’s internal market commissioner, said the bloc will require Elon Musk to add moderators in Europe to censor content.
Bloomberg News reported Friday that Breton criticized Musk’s decision to lay off moderators as well as his new pro-free speech changes to the platform. Breton said the government must “have control” over the content users post on the platform.
“He is in the process of reducing a certain number of moderators, but he will have to increase them in Europe,” Breton said, according to Bloomberg. “He will have to open his algorithms. We will have control, we will have access, people will no longer be able to say rubbish.”
Notably, the EU as a whole has favored more content moderation to prevent the spread of so-called “misinformation.”
Reuters reported last year that the Digital Markets Act (DMA) includes a list of actions companies can and cannot take online, while the Digital Services Act (DSA) targets “illegal” content online.
For his part, enacting pro-free speech policies at Twitter has been on Musk’s horizon for quite some time.
NewsBusters reported that Musk recently announced changes to Twitter’s censorship rules, insisting via tweet that “Twitter will not censor accurate information about anything.” He was responding to a query about Twitter’s election censorship policies from Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
After criticizing Twitter for unfairly censoring content from conservatives, he said he wanted to buy the company to promote free speech online.
“Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy,” he tweeted in March of this year.
He later reaffirmed his commitment to free speech on Twitter and added that “[f]ree speech is essential to a functioning democracy.”
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