The European Union (EU) Commission has declared that X, formerly Twitter, is the social media platform with the largest ratio of misinformation and disinformation posts.
The Commission’s Vice-President for Values and Transparency, Vera Jourova, stated this on Tuesday in a statement on the EU Code of Practice on Disinformation. She said X performed woefully during a pilot test of a new methodology developed by the Code signatories.
While other platforms like YouTube, TikTok, Microsoft, and Meta’s family apps were said to have taken some measures to address disinformation, X is said to be harbouring more disinformation actors.
But for the X owner, Elon Musk, his agenda is to use the platform to promote ‘free speech’ for people all over the world. Musk has yet to respond to the EU’s claim as of the time of filing this report.
- X, former Twitter, who is not under the Code anymore is the platform with the largest ratio of mis/disinformation posts. The pilot also showed that disinformation actors were found to have significantly more followers than their non-disinformation counterparts and tend to have joined the platform more recently than non-disinformation users,” Jourova declared.
What other platforms are doing
According to the EU Commission, all the social network platforms were asked to monitor specifically disinformation about the Russian war in Ukraine and the report shows that they have been taking significant steps in this regard.
- “Google reports that, between January and April 2023, YouTube terminated more than 400 channels involved in coordinated influence operations linked to the Russian-state-sponsored Internet Research Agency (IRA). Google also has removed ads from almost 300 sites linked to state-funded propaganda sites.
- “Meta reports expanding its fact-checking partnerships to 26 partners covering 22 languages in the EU, which now includes also Czech and Slovak.
- “TikTok’s fact-checking efforts cover Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, and 17 European languages, including through a new partnership with Reuters. In this context, 832 videos related to the war have been fact-checked, of which 211 have been removed.
- “Microsoft highlights that Bing Search has either promoted information or downgraded questionable information in relation to almost 800 thousand search queries related to the crisis,” Jourova said.
The VP said the platforms are expected to do more to achieve better results, adding that Russian propaganda and disinformation are still very present on online platforms.
- “This is not business as usual. The Kremlin fights with bombs in Ukraine but with words everywhere else, including in the EU,” she said.
Mitigating AI risks
Jourova also expressed satisfaction that major platforms have started to address the risks of generative AI by starting to put in place safeguards to inform users about the synthetic origin of content posted online. According to her, these efforts need to continue and intensify considering the high potential of such realistic AI products for creating and disseminating disinformation. She said the risks are particularly high in the context of elections.
