Twitter is being sued in Germany by two organisations who allege the social media platform neglected to remove six messages that attacked Jews and denied the Holocaust after they were reported.
The posts were issued after Elon Musk, the billionaire, purchased the platform in October 2022.
However, his tweets, which now constitute the majority of the company’s communications output, have not highlighted the matter.
In Germany, antisemitism and Holocaust denial are banned.
They also violate Twitter’s terms of service.
‘Hateful content’
“Twitter has betrayed our trust,” said Avital Grinberg, the president of the European Union of Jewish Students (EUJS), which has brought the civil action, alongside HateAid.
“By allowing hateful content to spread, the company fails to protect users – and Jews in particular.”
The case will try to determine whether Twitter is contractually obliged to remove such material.
HateAid legal head Josephine Ballon said: “Twitter assures it won’t tolerate violence on its platform. Users have to be able to rely on that.”
BBC News has reached out to the company for comment.
Large fines
Before Mr Musk bought Twitter in 2021, the Campaign Against Antisemitism, with which it had collaborated, said the company’s standards were failing, with only 400 of 1,000 tweets containing vile content assaulting Jews being removed.
The previous year, Twitter was attacked as overly sluggish to remove remarks by UK rapper Wiley that he later regretted for, stating they “were looked at as antisemitic”.
Boris Johnson, then Prime Minister, said social networks needed to “go further and faster to remove information like this”.
Similar claims have been leveled against other major social networks, including Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
Under the UK Online Safety Bill, technology companies would face large fines for failing to swiftly remove hateful content.
Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan hopes the bill will be passed into law this summer.
BBC
