The EU's Fine Against X Is Not About Speech or 'Censorship'

44 pointsposted 6 hours ago
by saubeidl
(techpolicy.press)

87 Comments

CamelCaseName

5 hours ago

How many people get scammed every day on X because the verification badge is a "Spend $1-5" badge?

This was especially plain to see in the crypto side of twitter.

Platforms cannot make statements on the legitimacy of a user without incurring some level of responsibility, regardless if it's "obvious" that a verified badge simply means that you've spent a couple dollars.

The average internet user is closer to your grandmother than you or me, and that is who these laws are meant to protect.

gruez

5 hours ago

>Platforms cannot make statements on the legitimacy of a user without incurring some level of responsibility, regardless if it's "obvious" that a verified badge simply means that you've spent a couple dollars.

So what's the right level of "responsibility"? Is letsencrypt issuing certificates to websites (which shows a lock icon in browsers) also fooling grandma into sending over her credit card details? What about EV certificates from a few years ago, where you paid ~$300/yr for a green lock? Should the EU get in the business of regulating what levels of verification are required to show lock/checkmark icons?

fidotron

5 hours ago

It will end like Germany where to put anything on the Internet your physical address must be visible.

This is what they've been pushing for with app stores.

GuestFAUniverse

5 hours ago

Not true. Personal and family matters do not need an impress.

You might want to read Rundfunkstaatsvertrag (RStV), (§ 55 Abs. 1): "Anbieter von Telemedien, die nicht ausschließlich persönlichen oder familiären Zwecken dienen, haben folgende Informationen leicht erkennbar, unmittelbar erreichbar und ständig verfügbar zu halten: Namen und Anschrift, bei juristischen Personen auch Namen und Anschrift des Vertretungsberechtigten."

Google translate: " Providers of telemedia services that are not exclusively for personal or family purposes must keep the following information easily recognizable, directly accessible and permanently available: name and address, and in the case of legal entities, also the name and address of the authorized representative. "

fidotron

5 hours ago

> Personal and family matters do not need an impress.

Does advocating for one political position or another count as a personal or family matter?

gjsman-1000

5 hours ago

To continue this train of thought, what happens when the EU decides that unverified users must be hidden by default and can only be accessed by direct lookup?

bigyabai

3 hours ago

X users would finally come to the realization that they own nothing and support an entirely unprincipled service?

ecshafer

5 hours ago

So as opposed to the old twitter method which was a vague “you know someone at twitter”, which led to random “journalists” and nobodies being verified. Paying money is just as arbitrary. Money at least means a credit card transaction happened.

ceejayoz

5 hours ago

An actual human employee at Twitter vouching for someone’s existence seems far more reputable than being able to purchase a Visa gift card in a convenience store.

Verification was “this account is who it says it is”. Not “this account has $10 to spare”.

energy123

6 hours ago

Regulate the algorithm. Make it boring.

nailer

6 hours ago

The algorithm is open source and on GitHub. It is pretty boring.

baobun

5 hours ago

No it is not open source and on GitHub. I think it is fair to call that repo fake. It is not even runnable code.

omnimus

5 hours ago

Also who cares what they publish. They would have to prove they run the same code. Otherwise it can be just gen AI coded whatever.

nickthegreek

5 hours ago

They have proved that they do not on several occasions.

CamelCaseName

5 hours ago

That's a very outdated algorithm, which is why X was willing to open source it.

nailer

5 hours ago

So campaign for an update.

touwer

5 hours ago

And you believe that?

cientifico

3 hours ago

I don't know how it is in US, but in Europe, the amount of scams is growing. Twitter blue checkmark was created to distinguish real humans vs scammers.

The fine was to protected the users from that scam.

I like paying taxes to protected the users that don't have the ability to detect scams as we all here have (most of the time).

EU miss the point equally to the Congress in uuss when non tech people believe they can rule (or just lobbied).

But on this case, there will be no problem if Twitter had decided to use another checkmark for pro accounts.

saubeidl

6 hours ago

tl;dr

The three reasons for the fine are:

* Lack of transparency / misleading verified checkmarks

* Lack of open data access

* Lack of any ad transparency showing who paid to show which ads

None of those are censorship. All of those are basic good governance and transparency.

The censorship angle is nothing but FUD by an admin terrified of good governance and transparency.

mikkupikku

6 hours ago

Two of those, "transparency" and "open data access" are demands from those who would subsequently use that information and access to inform and enforce censorship.

touwer

5 hours ago

Based on what information?

saubeidl

5 hours ago

That sounds like quite the claim, do you have any evidence to support it?

Personally, I'd like to know who is trying to steer the conversation, in light of psyop campaigns and hybrid warfare against our democracy.

I'd also like researchers to be able to examine how a large public forum is run.

Again, transparency is the name of the game.

mikkupikku

5 hours ago

> I'd like to know who is trying to steer the conversation, in light of psyop campaigns and hybrid warfare against our democracy.

What use is that information to governments, if not to guide their censorship efforts? It's a setup for labelling your opposition as "hybrid warfare" combatants, not because they picked up a gun but rather because they're saying things you think shouldn't be said.

saubeidl

5 hours ago

The information isn't made available to governments, it's made available to the people.

What X is scared of is showing that @AlabamaMAGALady and @DeutscherPatriot are based in St. Petersburg.

Again, there is no censorship. Just a transparency requirement.

DivingForGold

6 hours ago

[flagged]

drooopy

6 hours ago

Denial of free speech? In which way? And it's incomprehensible that you would bring random Ukraine bashing into your argument out of the blue.

squigz

6 hours ago

In what way has X/Twitter been innovative lately? I suppose renaming to X might count?

mittensc

6 hours ago

> US State Dept has just announced Visa restrictions on all those EU officials involved

So... what?

Visa restrictions can go both ways with US billionaires and politicians getting denied.

Who's gonna back down?

TZubiri

6 hours ago

The tweet:

TheRealElonMusk... (Verified) 4h tweeted

"I am a nazi"

The profile:

TheRealElonMuskLol398 - (Verified Parody)

This account is a parody. Disclaimer.

nailer

5 hours ago

Verification has never meant you’re a good person on any platform

ceejayoz

5 hours ago

Isn’t the problem that they verified “the real Elon Musk”?

nailer

26 minutes ago

According to OP they mention they’re parody account in their bio.

nailer

6 hours ago

Of course it is.

Prior checkmarks were for anyone who could pay 15K USD. X simply made it cheaper.

There is also a bizarre fine against Elon personally.

The EU makes more money from fining American tech companies than it makes from EU tech.

Don’t let unelected bureaucrats convince you that this is anything more than a revenue raising exercise for themselves.

touwer

5 hours ago

Sure. Don't inform yourself. Live in your own little biased world. It's cozy, isn't it. But not real

nailer

24 minutes ago

Everything in the post you’re replying to is easily verifiable at any source you want.

I miss when HN didn’t involve itself in these dumb political hatefests.

fidotron

5 hours ago

It's true, all those people that disagree with what you have been told are Russian bots.

You can sleep soundly again.

nutjob2

5 hours ago

EU laws are made by elected representatives.

You make unsupported claims of censorship, but how exactly is a fine against misleading blue dot censorship since it contains no speech? The company could change how they describe the blue dot or attach disclaimers but they don't.

Why? Because the EU's actions serve Musk's and the Administrations political goals of vilifying anyone who has a different view, especially the EU, and using the levers of the state to retaliate and threaten.

> The EU makes more money from fining American tech companies than it makes from EU tech.

If it wasn't for ASML there would be no tech industry. The world depends on a single EU company for advanced chips and for its continued prosperity.

> Don’t let unelected bureaucrats convince you that this is anything more than a revenue raising exercise for themselves.

You're just another EU hater pushing mindless tropes. Why are you so full of hate?

fidotron

5 hours ago

> EU laws are made by elected representatives.

No, they are voted on by elected representatives.

They must be proposed by the commission, which is not elected but appointed.

saubeidl

5 hours ago

Ugh not this misdirection again.

The commission is appointed by directly elected governments. It's the same as any ministerial post in any government.

It's also the same level of indirection as the US presidency, which is appointed by the Electoral College.

fidotron

5 hours ago

> Ugh not this misdirection again.

Oh no! Someone pointed out an inconvenient fact again!

> It's also the same level of indirection as the US presidency, which is appointed by the Electoral College.

But the US President doesn't have a monopoly on setting the agenda of Congress, the Commission does with respect to the EU Parliament. Anyone with any political awareness knows that if you set the agenda you control the outcome.

nutjob2

4 hours ago

You're wrong on facts and wrong on the comparison with the US system.

The US president can't propose laws, only Congress can, yet he can "set the agenda".

Only the EU Commission can propose laws, but the EU Council (composed of the heads of state or of government of the EU member states) sets the agenda.

"The European Council is a collegiate body and a symbolic collective head of state, that defines the overall political direction and general priorities of the European Union."

They are functionally equivalent.

fidotron

3 hours ago

> The US president can't propose laws, only Congress can, yet he can "set the agenda".

Fantastic example of unintentional scare quotes.

> Only the EU Commission can propose laws, but the EU Council (composed of the heads of state or of government of the EU member states) sets the agenda.

Who has to nominate all the possible members of the EU Commission? Is it the EU Council?

Face it, the entire EU structure is designed to prevent little people from ever being able to get a law passed which would possibly benefit them except as populist measures inside the EU which stick it to the evil Americans again to promote internal support for the EU.

saubeidl

5 hours ago

> Oh no! Someone pointed out an inconvenient fact again!

It's not a fact. It's just pedantry that is conveniently not applied anywhere else. Nobody would say the US president isn't elected or ministers aren't elected, but when it comes to the EU a double standard is applied by dishonest ideologues.

The rest of your post is classic moving of goal posts, but fwiw Congress has been absolutely irrelevant since the sitting president decided to rule by decree.

fidotron

5 hours ago

> It's not a fact. It's just pedantry

Absolute gold, thanks for that.

> The rest of your post is classic moving of goal posts.

At least you lot have a wicked sense of irony.

orwin

4 hours ago

I will remark that no one disputed OP when he remarked that the US executive power is also appointed, not elected, and that weirdly no one make the same point about how undemocratic it is. It does rs feel like OP is right about ideologues only being pedantic when it serves their points.

nutjob2

3 hours ago

Your understanding of irony is at an Alanis Morissette level.

wrongagainyyyy

5 hours ago

No, it's more like an ambassador that's appointed by the president, you see we have presidential tickets and you get the two people you vote for, which is different from voting for someone then having the person you vote for decide who to appoint.

Yes technically the us 'electors' could vote for a different presidential ticket, but that's never happened in practice and even then their options are generally limited by who ran, electors can't pick just anyone.

saubeidl

5 hours ago

Technically there is a level of indirection even in the presidency, but sure.

Nobody ever complains about ambassadors not being democratic though. Same thing goes for, idk, a Secretary of State or whatever, they all go through the same process.

Only when it comes to EU institutions people can't hide their hatred and can't help themselves but make the same old dishonest claim.

letsthinkmoreok

5 hours ago

So there's even so bigger differences because an ambassadors are appointed and can be easily removed, also us ambassadors don't all huddle together, elect leaders between them then get busy making regulations that impact their original constituints, it might be closer to say federal chairmen, once appointed extremely hard to rescind and then are given real powers.

The federal reserve isn't known as especially democratic.

Only people being dishonest are those who ignore massive speech restrictions in europe. Look up cj Hopkins. I could go on and on and on. Sadly my comment likely to never even be seen because of how aggressive hn is whenever there's any intelligent push back to the progressive/liberal agenda.

Edit. If your takeaway aftertwo minute search on cj hopkins is lol Nazis are bad, then you have much more profound problems with research and basic understanding of reality then I can assist you with. Try going through the actual court documents and primary sources for once in your life instead of just letting whichever source of truth you trust to propagandize you.

saubeidl

5 hours ago

> Look up cj Hopkins

Yikes, I just did. Trivializing the holocaust in Germany of all places is not a good look.

Edit: This is exclusively based on the primary source - a book cover where the guy was using a swastika (!!!) to critise a policy he didn't like - i.e. made light of the holocaust. If you don't understand why that's completely unacceptable, I don't know what to tell you.

letsthinkmoreok

4 hours ago

[dead]

saubeidl

4 hours ago

Context matters.

It's one thing to use something for documentary purposes or in art. It's another to use it to make light of the holocaust like this guy did. It's all clearly written in our law.

If that person didn't want to follow our law, why did he come here? Why do we have to bother with criminal immigrants that don't want to integrate into our way of life?

nutjob2

4 hours ago

If they weren't you'd be whining about a loss of sovereignty by EU states. It's an idiotic catch 22.

The EU systems balances national sovereignty with direct democracy but leans toward the former. It's a good system.

Anyway, EU states went to great lengths to join the EU and can leave at any time. Besides the self-destructive UK, none have.

> They must be proposed by the commission, which is not elected but appointed.

The commission is elected by elected representatives. Just like in many countries the leader isn't directly elected by voters but by their elected representatives.

Your comment is just ideological nonsense. You could argue in good faith about the pros and cons of various systems but you don't, it's just hate because you heard Trump or Musk or some right wing figure say it say it and you're garrotting it.

Prove me wrong by detailing whats wrong with it, and "muh democracy" doesn't count.

fidotron

4 hours ago

> Prove me wrong by detailing whats wrong with it, and "muh democracy" doesn't count.

We're at the "make arbitrary demands" stage of blatant denialism then.

submeta

6 hours ago

The EU is acting in an increasingly restrictive manner, sanctioning journalists and citizens deemed pro-Russian or anti-Israeli. Some of those targeted are reportedly unable to open bank accounts or travel. This suggests a growing conviction within the EU that certain viewpoints are acceptable, while others are effectively prohibited and carry tangible consequences. How should this trend be described? Is it a form of totalitarianism, or something else?

m4ck_

5 hours ago

Seems reasonable considering that Russia has absolutely no respect for European borders or laws. Why should they allow Russian assets to further damage Europe? They are literally waging war against Europe, and it's not just limited to Ukraine.

Russia has staged assassinations on European soil using radioactive and chemical weapons. They've sabotaged civilian and military infrastructure (both digitally and physically), plotted to bomb civilian cargo flights, etc. How much farther should Russia and it's agents be allowed to go before they're considered security risks?

AlphaGeekZulu

6 hours ago

The XX is acting in an increasingly restrictive manner, sanctioning journalists and citizens deemed pro-XX or anti-XX. Some of those targeted are reportedly unable to open bank accounts or travel. Some of them are called "stupid" or "pigs". This suggests a growing conviction within the XX that certain viewpoints are acceptable, while others are effectively prohibited and carry tangible consequences. How should this trend be described? Is it a form of totalitarianism, or something else?

Try to find matches for the XX placeholders!

ecshafer

4 hours ago

This is a perfect place for a prolog program.

submeta

6 hours ago

And what exactly did you add to the discussion, beyond posturing

AlphaGeekZulu

5 hours ago

Logic! If the described properties define totalitarianism, then they do so for any value that can truthfully be substituted for XX. I suggest checking this for all ~195 possible values.

submeta

an hour ago

No you did not. The XX substitution is a clever rhetorical move, but it misses what’s actually being debated. This isn’t about whether a logical predicate can be made to fit many countries; it’s about whether certain state practices are becoming acceptable.

What’s concerning here isn’t “wrong opinions being criticized,” it’s administrative punishment without criminal process: loss of banking access, travel bans, and professional exclusion imposed by executive designation, justified after the fact as “they must be criminals anyway.” That logic works for any XX, and that’s exactly the problem.

This doesn’t make the EU “totalitarian,” but it does point to an illiberal drift where due process is treated as optional if the target is politically unsympathetic. The precedent matters more than the headcount. Once viewpoint + security assessment is enough to trigger real penalties, the boundary between law enforcement and political enforcement starts to blur, regardless of which XX you plug in.

nutjob2

5 hours ago

And what exactly did you add to the discussion, beyond posturing

touwer

5 hours ago

It's not perfect, but by all means it's better than the so called free speech of the US-Maga cult

realusername

6 hours ago

> Some of those targeted are reportedly unable to open bank accounts or travel.

Yeah sure """journalists""", the list of individuals under sanction in the EU is small and usually there's a good reason they are in that list.

submeta

5 hours ago

The size of the list is irrelevant. What matters is the precedent. Restricting banking or travel based on political assessments, without criminal conviction or transparent judicial review, is a serious breach of the rule of law. Simply asserting “good reasons” is not an argument.

realusername

5 hours ago

All the people in this list are criminals of various kind, money laundrers and some of them even terrorists.

You should ask yourself the opposite, why people supporting Russian views in the EU often are from a criminal background?

submeta

5 hours ago

Labeling everyone on a sanctions list as a “criminal” or “terrorist” dodges the core issue, which is the erosion of due process. EU sanctions are administrative measures, not criminal convictions: people are listed by executive decision, often on the basis of political and security assessments, without indictment, trial, or a judgment by an independent court. That means being sanctioned does not logically equal “proven criminal”; it means the person has been designated by a political body that, by design, operates outside the safeguards of criminal procedure

realusername

5 hours ago

Fine, the day it affects real people, I'll also push for a change. I doubt it will ever be though.

For now excuse me but I won't cry for the poor money laundrers of the Russian mafia and their yachts.

This list is public as well, feel free to consult it.

dangus

5 hours ago

Why don’t you go ahead and finish your argument?

The EU is hypocritical, and the restrictions on freedom you see in Russia are actually way less extreme versions of the exact same laws in the books in Europe. Europe did it first and Russia is way more reasonable about it.

I swear you’re not even very far from repeating a Steve Rosenberg Vladimir Putin exchange verbatim.

It would be kind of hilarious how gullible the tech libertarian bro demographic is to Russian propaganda if it wasn’t so sad and dangerous.

submeta

4 hours ago

So instead of exchanging arguments, you prefer to put people on sanctions lists, because they are on the wrong side from your standpoint? Is this the Europe you want to live in?

whynotmaybe

6 hours ago

It's by design and has always be in many European countries that you can say anything you want except what is prohibited.

For example, in many countries it's illegal to say that WWII concentration camps didn't exist.

In Belgium, a media can't make a publication that mocks the King.

throw310822

5 hours ago

Confirmed. I find article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights particularly enlightening:

"1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. [...]

2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary."

To me it reads as "you have the right to free speech without interference by public authorities, except in all cases where public authorities want to interfere in whatever form and for whatever reason".

whynotmaybe

5 hours ago

Which is the same for every country with declared "freedom of expression", even the US.

dangus

5 hours ago

Next time you make an argument like this you might want to try to make one that isn’t easily debunked by a quick google search:

https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2023/01/07/belgians-to-skip-jai...

Belgians are allowed to criticize the monarchy and the only protections the king has are the same defamation protections that every citizen has.

As far as being disallowed from denying the holocaust, there are very obvious good reasons for that law in Germany. I’d love for you to attempt to explain how it’s a bad thing without looking pro-fascist.

Remember the tolerance paradox. Tolerating intolerance is not something that promotes personal liberty and freedom.

whynotmaybe

5 hours ago

I left Europe decades ago and now I stand corrected, the law's been repealed in 2023 based on judgment from 2021.

> I’d love for you to attempt to explain how it’s a bad thing

I'm not here for that, I was just stating facts. Each country/culture/civilization has their own characterization of good and bad.

Some goes as far as saying that tolerance for everything is "good" and that if you don't tolerate everything you're "bad".

mikkupikku

5 hours ago

If Congress had a spine they would make it illegal for American corporations to collaborate with foreign countries in restricting any speech which would be legal in America. And if the EU had a spine, the would blanket ban all American social media. We're in this situation now because both sides are pussyfooting around the source of conflict, fundamentally incompatible values, never seeking resolution because it's easier to just continue with the status quo and ignore the resulting tensions. No respect for either side.

potatototoo99

5 hours ago

They are not pussyfooting, if governments did what you say everything would be illegal and all borders closed, war soon to follow. Collaborating with foreign countries is what it means to find resolution to issues.

mikkupikku

2 hours ago

Oh please, give me a break. WW3 because Europe has European social media instead of being stuck on American properties? I can always count on HN for the most insane takes.

This social media shit obviously needs to be based in the country it operates, that's the only way these international moderation policy issues can ever be resolved.