Elon Musk Fined IDR 6 Billion Due To X Not Cooperating In Investigation Of Anti-Child Abuse Practices In Australia

Australian e-Safety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant (photo: twitter @eSafetyOffice)

JAKARTA - The Australian e-Safety Commission has imposed a fine of 610,500 Australian dollars (IDR 6 billion) on Elon Musk's social media platform, X, for failing to cooperate with an investigation into anti-child abuse practices. This is a blow to the company, which has struggled to retain advertisers amid complaints that it has been lenient in moderating content.

X, the platform changed by Musk from Twitter, was fined by the e-Safety commission for failing to answer the question, including how long they responded to reports on the material of abuse of children on the platform and the method used to detect it.

Although the nominal amount is small compared to the 44 billion US dollars (IDR 690.9 trillion) that Musk paid for the website in October 2022, the fine is a reputational blow for a company that has seen a steady decline in revenue. This is due to advertisers cutting spending on the platform which has stopped most content moderation and reinstated thousands of banned accounts.

Recently, the European Union said it was investigating X for alleged violations of new technology rules after the platform was accused of failing to control disinformation related to Hamas attacks on Israel.

"If you have the answers to those questions, if you actually put the people, processes and technology in place to tackle illegal content en masse, and globally, and if that's your priority, it's pretty easy to answer," said e-Safety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant in an interview, as quoted from Reuters.

X closed its Australian office after Musk's purchase, leaving no local representative available to respond to the media. A request for comment sent to the San Francisco-based company's media email address was not immediately answered.

Under an Australian law that comes into effect in 2021, regulators can force internet companies to provide information about their online security practices or face fines. "If X refuses to pay the fine, the regulator can bring charges against the company in court," Grant said.

After taking over the company, Musk said in a post that "eliminating child exploitation is a top priority". However, Australian regulators said when asked how they prevented child abuse on the platform, X responded that it was "not a service used by a large number of young people".

Company X told regulators that available anti-harassment technology “does not have sufficient capability or accuracy to be implemented on Twitter.”

Warning from Google

Inman Grant said the commission had also issued a warning to Alphabet-owned Google for not complying with requests for information about its handling of child abuse content, calling the search giant's response to some questions "general." Google said it was cooperating with regulators and was disappointed by the warning.

"We remain committed to this effort and collaborating constructively and in good faith with the e-Safety Commissioner, government and industry in a joint effort to keep Australians safe online," said Google's Director of Government Affairs and Public Policy for Australia, Lucinda Longcroft.

X-compliance X is more serious, the regulator said, including the inability to answer questions about how long they responded to the child's abuse report, the steps taken to detect child abuse in live broadcasts, and the number of staff moderation of content, security, and their public policy.

The company confirmed to regulators that it had cut 80% of its workforce globally and had no public policy staff in Australia, compared with two before Musk's purchase.

X told regulators that their proactive detection of child abuse material in public posts decreased after Musk took over the company.

The company told regulators it did not use tools to detect such material in private messages. "They argued that the technology was still under development," the regulator said.