The European Commission announced on Friday additional measures in the ongoing proceedings against social media platform X under the Digital Services Act (DSA).

The European Commission adopted three new investigatory measures. First, the EU obliged X to provide information on its recommender system, including any changes made to this algorithm. Moreover, the EU issued a “retention order,” which requires the Very Large Online Platform (VLOP) to maintain and preserve any information regarding future changes made to its recommender system until December 31, 2025. Lastly, the commission requested information on some of X’s commercial Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) that allow fact-finding for content moderation practices.

Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy Henna Virkkunen commented: “Today we are taking further steps to shed light on the compliance of X’s recommender systems with the obligations under the DSA.” Virkkunen stated that the request for information aims to “make the online environment fair, safe, and democratic for all European citizens.”

Several German politicians recently criticized Elon Musk’s support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AFD) Party on the social media platform X. Being the owner of the platform, Musk faces accusations of interfering with the upcoming German elections in February 2025, which could violate provisions of the DSA.

The European Commission already initiated formal proceedings against X on December 2023. The first preliminary findings of these proceedings concluded a breach of European legislation, particularly Articles 25, 39, and 40(12) of the DSA. If the commission confirms these findings, it could impose economic fines on X and force the platform to address the breaches. As of now, the European Commission is continuing investigations and requesting more information from the social media platform.