Elon Musk’s X refused to hand over hundreds of account details to British authorities during and after last summer’s riots, as the US billionaire attacked the Government for imprisoning people for social media posts. The Telegraph has the story.
Figures published by X, formerly known as Twitter, showed that the company refused over half of UK Government information requests in the second half of 2024.
It handed over information in 379 out of 806 cases, a 47% disclosure rate. The rate is significantly lower than those of Google, Meta, TikTok and LinkedIn.
The figures cover requests from police and other law enforcement agencies, and can include data such as people’s email, internet addresses and an account’s private messages.
The data covered July and August’s riots, when dozens of people were arrested for social media posts and some received prison sentences.
During the summer, Mr Musk compared Britain to the Soviet Union and accused the newly elected Labour Government of “censorship”.
In January, he wrote: “At this rate, the UK Government will pretty soon be executing people for liking a meme!”
Police routinely ask social media companies to hand over information to assist in law enforcement investigations, often to help identify anonymous accounts or see who they might be communicating with.
Legal teams at the companies assess the requests, and can reject them if they are seen as overly broad or legally dubious. A small number are made as emergency requests, where police consider there is an imminent threat.
X’s legal website says it “may seek to narrow requests that are overly broad, request additional context if the nature of the investigation is not clear, or push back on the request for other reasons”.
Worth reading in full.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.