Platform X has blocked the European Commission from running ads – a move that comes just days after the European Union regulator fined Elon Musk’s platform €120m over its blue verification badge system, the BBC reports.
Nikita Bier, a senior official at X, accused the EU regulator of trying to “exploit a vulnerability” in its advertising system to expand its announcement of the fine on Friday.
“You seem to believe that the rules should not apply to your account,” Bier said. “Your ad account has been terminated.”
A European Commission spokesman said the Commission “always uses all social platforms in good faith.” The fine X received on Friday was the first under the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA).
EU says X misled users
The EU regulator said the platform’s blue verification badge system was “misleading” because the company failed to “substantially verify users.”
“This deception exposes users to fraud, including impersonation and other forms of manipulation by malicious actors,” it said.
It also says that X does not provide sufficient transparency about ads, nor does it allow researchers to access public data.
The platform has 60 days to respond to the European Commission’s concerns about the blue labels, or it could face additional fines.
After the sentence, Elon Musk announced that the EU “should be scrapped” and then shared another user’s post comparing it to fascism.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) accused the EU regulator of “attacking American companies” and said “the days of censoring Americans online are over”.
Dispute due to “exploitation of the system”
The standoff began after Bier accused the Commission of activating a rarely used account “to exploit a vulnerability.” He claimed that the Commission had published a link that led users to believe it was a video, “artificially increasing its reach.”
He added that the “vulnerability,” which had never before “been abused in this way,” had been fixed.
X’s advertising accounts are used to create and analyze paid campaigns and to publish “promoted” posts, separate from the user’s profile.
In response, a Commission spokesperson said that the Commission “was only using the tools that the platforms themselves make available to our corporate accounts.”
“We expect these tools to comply with the platform’s own rules, as well as with our legislative framework,” he added.
X’s past run-ins with regulators
This is not the first time X has clashed with regulators around the world.
In 2024, Brazil’s Supreme Court lifted a ban on the platform after the company agreed to pay 28 million reais and block accounts accused of spreading misinformation.
A year earlier, Australia’s internet safety regulator fined X 610,000 Australian dollars for failing to cooperate with an investigation into child abuse prevention.
