Contrary to other promises
Musk fires half of his election watchdog team
September 28, 2023, 8:49 p.m
Listen to article
This audio version was artificially generated. More info | Send feedback
The X boss Yaccarino, appointed by tech billionaire Musk, only confirmed this week that the online platform is expanding its team to fight misinformation about elections. Apparently, however, exactly the opposite is the case.
The online platform X is drastically reducing the number of its employees who are supposed to take action against the spread of false information about elections. X owner Elon Musk partially confirmed a report by the online medium “The Information” that the short message service formerly known as Twitter is cutting half of the jobs in this area.
“Oh, you mean the ‘Election Integrity’ team that undermined election integrity?” the high-tech billionaire wrote on X. “Yes, they’re gone.” The move comes at a critical time: There are more than 50 major elections worldwide next year, including the European elections in June and the US congressional and presidential elections in November 2024.
The X boss appointed by Musk, Linda Yaccarino, assured this week that the online platform was expanding its election team. “There is a robust and growing team at X dedicated to election integrity,” she said at a conference. An evaluation by the EU Commission recently came to the conclusion that of the large online platforms, X has the largest proportion of false information.
Musk pulled out of an agreement on how to deal with misinformation between the EU and major online services. Critics accuse the head of electric car maker Tesla of having sharply scaled back content moderation and cracking down on hate speech and misinformation since he took over Twitter last year.
Platform could turn a profit next year
Regardless, according to Yaccarino, profits could start in early 2024. “The speed of change and scale of ambition at
Yaccarino said about 1,500 advertisers have returned to the platform in the past 12 weeks. A total of 90 percent of the company’s 100 largest advertising partners are back. Since Musk took over the social media company in October 2022, many advertisers initially dropped out because they feared appearing next to unsuitable content.