Elon Musk’s X accepts UK rules on hate speech, militant content

Elon Musk’s X has agreed to Britain’s crackdown on hate speech and militant content, aiming to protect UK users from online abuse and illegal content after months of regulatory pressure.

According to Britain’s media regulator, Ofcom, under the agreement it will be mandatory for X to review suspected and extremist or terrosrism-related posts within 24 hours on average.

The social media platform must assess 85 percent of content at least within 48 hours.

The regulator also added that X promised to restrict accounts which are primarily operated by the banned organizations under UK laws.

After assessing the accounts, X would submit quarterly performance data to Ofcom over the next year. Oliver Griffiths, Ofcom's online safety group director, said, "We have evidence that ​terrorist content and illegal hate speech is persisting on some of the largest social media sites.”

The social media platform will also take significant steps to improve its reporting systems by engaging with external experts. This step would redress the complaints of civil society groups who reported that flagged content was not clearly acted on.

In Britain, X’s compliance to these rules holds a significant importance as attacks on Jewish communities have seen an uptick in previous weeks.

Moreover, earlier this year, Grok also caught in firestorm for posting sexualized and obscene images.

Besides the UK, regulators in the EU, Singapore, and Australia have also raised concern over growing hateful content on X. Even the EU Commission launched an investigation into X over its failure to curb hate speech.