Status: 04/27/2022 4:33 p.m
The EU reacted calmly to Musk’s Twitter takeover and warned: The same rules still apply to digital companies in Europe. In doing so, she overlooks another important goal of the deal.
What is Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter really about? The social media platform that is so popular with people from politics and journalism in particular – because you can say your opinion in a few lines and get into a more or less intensive discussion. Musk wants to make Twitter a really open forum, free of any censorship, some say; Above all, Musk wants to own Twitter’s data overload and continue to work on his global base for artificial intelligence in this way, the others say.
It is correct: AI systems cannot do without personalized data. And it was Musk himself who said before the purchase that it would be possible to digitally capture and identify all real people in the long run if the deal was a success. He was – from the point of view of the EU parliamentarian Patrick Breyer, however, a dangerous one.
Expert advises to change platform
Breyer from the Pirate Party is considered a proven digital expert. He warns that one’s own identity, home address and private telephone numbers will no longer be in safe hands on Twitter. The fact that you could previously use the platform anonymously was a significant advantage, especially for whistleblowers, minorities or critics of the regime. If Musk now introduces compulsory identification, it will be over. The advice of the digital politician: Leave Twitter and switch to other services where anonymity is maintained.
In any case, the Twitter purchase by the Tesla boss is being carefully noted in Brussels. Also because Musk has announced that he is supposed to make Twitter a thoroughly open forum for all opinions. Musk calls it democratic. But critics fear that Twitter will then also depict anti-democratic opinions, hate and hate speech, fake news – everything that the European Union, with its recently passed laws for large digital platforms, would like to have removed from the Internet in the future.
It is about a binding set of rules for large digital corporations – so-called gatekeepers with an annual turnover of at least 7.5 billion euros and more than 45 million users per month in the EU. These are rules that, on the one hand, secure competition on the digital markets so that smaller companies from Europe can compete against the Internet giants from the USA; and which, on the other hand, should ensure compliance with basic democratic principles and the rule of law on the Internet.
EU digital laws continue to apply
In Brussels they are called the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act. It was only finally launched at the end of last week. After only a year and a half of preparation, which in Brussels is considered to be extremely fast for a legislative package of such scope and shows how seriously the EU takes the matter.
The regulations have it all. In the future, large Internet platforms will have to submit their own risk assessment once a year with a view to the dangers to freedom of expression or fundamental rights that their offers could pose. They must minimize the risks and remove dangerous content – and all of this is controlled by the EU Commission itself. So that Europe’s taxpayers don’t have to bear the costs for this, the Internet companies will pay a supervisory fee in the future.
In Brussels it is assumed that all this also applies to Twitter and Musk. And that’s why you are also reasonably relaxed when it comes to this takeover. In any case, for EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton, who has made decisive progress in regulating online giants together with the European Parliament, there is no reason for concern: every company in the European Union must comply with the rules that apply, he says – so simply be that. Anyone who doesn’t do that faces penalties of up to six percent of global annual sales – that could be several hundred million in this case.
Use AI – by all means
Whether Twitter, in Musk’s ownership, will stick to the European online rules of the game in the future is only a question. At least as important is the issue of artificial intelligence, which Elon Musk is likely to be primarily concerned with: it is clear that it is considered a key technology of the future, with which groundbreaking developments could be launched – for example in medicine or in science industrial production. On the other hand, however, many are convinced that AI will make people less and less important as decision-makers and designers of this world.
Either way: AI will come. And while Musk is apparently taking another step in this direction with the Twitter deal, comparatively little is happening in the EU. After all, a Europe-wide set of rules on artificial intelligence is being prepared, and the European Parliament wants to discuss it next week.
In Europe, too much emphasis is placed on data protection and risks, says CDU European delegate Axel Voss – although AI offers so many opportunities. Musk wants to use them by any means. Europe will have to slow him down so that he sticks to European rules. But he certainly won’t let that stop him.