X served 90% more removal orders in 6 months under Musk

A great defender of freedom of expression and transparency, Elon Musk responded to more requests to remove content from X (formerly Twitter) compared to the period before the businessman purchased the platform, on October 27, 2022.

Survey of Poder360using information from the Lumen database, shows that from October 27, 2022 to April 13, 2023, 971 government or court orders to remove content were sent to the company.

Lumen is managed by the Berkman Klein Center For Internet & Society research center at Harvard University in the United States. It’s a public tool that tracks content removal requests. To achieve this, technology companies such as X Corp., Google, YouTube, Wikipedia and Reddit voluntarily share data.

According to the information, Musk met 90% more demands compared to the 6 months prior to his purchase of the platform.

In absolute numbers, the social network fulfilled 506 requests from May 1, 2022 to October 26, 2023, with 277 fulfilled completely and 229 partially.

Under Musk’s command, the platform fulfilled 962 orders from October 27, 2022 to April 13, 2023. Of these, 808 were fully and 154 partially.

COUNTRIES

Lumen also identifies which countries sent removal demands. Of the 971, only two orders did not present this information.

In the period from October 27, 2022 to April 13, 2023, 808 requests were fulfilled completely and 154 partially. None were classified as not fulfilled, but the survey indicated 9 as “blank”.

Turkey and Germany were the countries that led the most in removal requests in the period, with 491 and 255, respectively. They are followed by India, with 50 requests. Brazil appears in 4th place.

One of the Indian removal requests involves the removal of content related to the documentary BBC “India: the Modi Question”, in which the British broadcaster questions the role of the country’s Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, in the Gujarat uprising in 2002. At least 1,000 Muslims were killed. At the time, Musk faced accusations of being complicit in the Asian nation’s state censorship. The case took place in January 2023.

There is no information as to why there is a lack of up-to-date data on takedown requests on Lumen. Furthermore, the company has not released a report on the issue since July 2022. last document presented data from the 2nd half of 2021.

As a result, Lumen does not account for the platform’s refusal to remove 45 publications related to criticism of the Turkish government. The case was disclosed by X Corp., responsible for managing X, in a post on the social network published on March 1st of this year.

The database also does not record the removal, in April, of 4 publications made on the social network by Indian politicians and parties. According to X Corp. The posts were taken down after the Indian Election Commission ordered the move. Musk’s company, however, said it disagreed with the action.

“We argue that freedom of expression should extend to these publications and political speech in general,” said X Corp, in a statement published on Tuesday (April 16).

MUSK X MORAES

On April 7, the minister of the STF (Supreme Federal Court) Alexandre de Moraes determined the inclusion of Elon Musk as being investigated in the digital militias investigation, filed in July 2021 and which investigates groups for conduct against democracy.

The platform is also prohibited from disobeying any court order issued. IThis includes reactivating profiles already blocked by determination of the STF or TSE (Superior Electoral Court). In case of non-compliance, the daily fine is R$100,000. The decision came after the owner of X escalated his tone against the STF minister throughout the weekend (6-7 April). Here’s the complete (PDF – 161 kB).

On April 8, X’s defense sent a petition to the STF, claiming that it cannot guarantee compliance with decisions. The platform mentioned “technical and physical limits” in Brazil to fulfill orders. Here is the full document (PDF – 172 kB).

According to X’s defense, the removal of content is exclusive to the operator of the platform abroad. From this, the petition asks the STF that all decisions involving court orders be forwarded to X Corp., responsible for managing the platform.

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