Musk Calls Australia ‘Fascists’ Over Social Media Regulation

Entrepreneur Elon Musk has called the Australian government “fascists” over a proposed law aimed at reining in misinformation on social media platforms such as X, formerly Twitter, which Musk owns.

Responding on X to a post about the law, which was unveiled last Thursday, Musk wrote a one-word message: “Fascists.”

The country’s Labor government said the law would enable fines of up to 5 percent of a company’s global turnover for enabling misinformation, joining a broad international push to rein in large tech companies.

The proposed law would require tech companies to set codes of conduct to stop dangerous falsehoods from spreading, which would be approved by the country’s communications regulator.

Regulation

If a platform fails to do so the regulator would set its own rules and fine firms for non-compliance.

“This bill improves the transparency and accountability of platforms for users and the Australian people,” said communications minister Michelle Rowland.

Government services minister Bill Shorten told Channel Nine’s breakfast show that Musk had had “more positions on free speech than the Kama Sutra”.

“When it’s in its commercial interests, he is the champion of free speech and when he doesn’t like it… he’s going to shut it all down,” he said.

Assistant treasurer Stephen Jones said platforms had no excuse for distributing scams and violent content.

“For the life of me, I can’t see how Elon Musk or anyone else, in the name of free speech, thinks it is OK to have social media platforms publishing scam content, which is robbing Australians of billions of dollars every year,” he told ABC TV.

“Publishing deepfake material, publishing child pornography. Livestreaming murder scenes. I mean, is this what he thinks free speech is all about?”

Controversy

In April the eSafety commissioner ordered X to remove graphic clips of Sydney bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel being stabbed, but the platform instead blocked the content from being viewed in Australia.

The government and Musk exchanged barbs for a month before the eSafety office dropped the case in favour of pursuing other ongoing legal matters.

In federal court last week X challenged a 610,500 Australian-dollar (£311,878) fine issued last year, saying the fine was issued to Twitter, which ceased to exist in March 2023 when the company merged with X Corp.

Brazil this month banned X amidst a row between Musk and a Supreme Court judge over blocking accounts that were under investigation.

X, Meta, Telegram and other social media platforms have been regularly taken to task for content moderation issues, with the EU taking a harder line since the passage of the Digital Services Act (DSA) this year.