EU Scrutinizes X After Elon Musk Amplifies Disinformation on Fico Shooting

Following Slovakia's prime minister Robert Fico's shooting incident on Wednesday, EU Digital Services Act (DSA) authorities warned that they are closely watching misinformation efforts on Elon Musk's social network X, previously Twitter.

X has been under EU investigation since December on concerns about civic discourse disinformation and the social platform's crowdsourced 'Community Notes' content moderation tool. However, no punishments have been issued, according to TechCrunch.

Elon Musk May Face Sanctions

Elon Musk replied to right-wing political influencer Ian Miles Cheong's X post linking the massacre to Fico's rejection of the WHO's pandemic preventive proposal on Wednesday. The tech billionaire's action amplified the matter, per the report.

A senior Commission official told the press that they are monitoring platform content and analyzing whether X's disinformation mitigation measures are working as part of the continuing probe.

Elon Musk may face fines of up to 6% of worldwide annual turnover for DSA violations, making his online actions expensive in future regulatory enforcement cycles.

Robert Fico was shot five times in a politically motivated murder attempt and had emergency surgery Wednesday. His deputy, Tomas Taraba, told the BBC the procedure was successful and believes the Slovakian leader "will survive."

Slovak and other European authorities have condemned the attack, one of the worst against a European politician in decades, raising concerns that Europe's increasingly polarised political atmosphere has turned violent, as reported by The New York Times.

A guy moved forward and fired a handgun from close range as Fico, 59, approached a small group behind a waist-high metal fence in Handlova's main plaza. Five shots are heard.

Slovakian President Zuzana Caputova denounced the Fico shooting incident, calling it "an attack on democracy."

Fico has been a major force in Slovak politics for 30 years, starting as a communist and moving right with Smer. He was prime minister from 2006 to 2010 and 2012 to 2018, returning in elections last year. After leaving office amid mass demonstrations in 2018, he was re-elected on social conservatism, nationalism, and welfare promises.

EU Closely Monitoring X

On Thursday, X revealed that EU premium customers may now use Elon Musk's generative AI chatbot Grok, which is politically incorrect compared to OpenAI's ChatGPT. Musk momentarily celebrated: "Grok is now available in Europe."

A senior Commission official said the EU is in close communication with X about Grok's launch. Due to concerns about civic debate and elections, the official said X has postponed the rollout of several Grok features in the region until after the European Parliament election.

The Grok AI chatbot recently faced backlash when it spread on social media platform X a fake news report stating NBA player Klay Thompson committed vandalism and violence in Sacramento, California but the athlete did not commit such an act.

As per a TechTimes report, the story trended after a Golden State Warriors-Sacramento Kings NBA game, wherein Thompson scored zero points in 32 minutes-- an awful performance that the basketball community calls "shooting bricks."

Grok AI, famed for its literal readings, assumed Thompson's bad performance was illegal. Thompson was wrongly accused of a Sacramento crime spree by the chatbot, which went viral on X.

Despite the story's popularity, Thompson's terrible game is unconnected to Sacramento's vandalism or violence. Some consider the occurrence insulting to basketball, although the Grok AI chatbot misinterpreted it, not the Warriors guard committed a crime.