News Desk
ISLAMABAD/New York: The United Nations and the EU have condemned Elon Musk after he ordered banning some journalists on Twitter.
One group of people unable to access their accounts were journalists for the Washington Post, New York Times, and CNN. While the EU has threatened Twitter with sanctions, the UN has tweeted that media freedom is “not a toy.” A Twitter representative explained to a US tech news website that the bans applied to the real-time sharing of location information.
According to Melissa Fleming, the UN’s under-secretary-general for international communications reports that journalists were being “arbitrarily” suspended from Twitter left her “deeply disturbed.”
She declared, “Media freedom is not a toy.” The foundation of democratic societies is a free press, which is also crucial in the struggle against harmful misinformation. Earlier on Friday, Vera Jourova, an EU commissioner, threatened Twitter with penalties under the new Digital Services Act in Europe, which she claimed is necessary to ensure “the respect of media freedom and foundation rights.”
“That should be known to Elon Musk. Red lines can be seen. as well as sanctions, “She added.
Mr. Musk has not officially mentioned the suspensions. Criticizing me all day long is acceptable, but following my real-time locations and putting my family at risk is not, he wrote in a tweet.
The tech billionaire then posted a poll asking people whether they felt the accounts should be unfrozen “immediately” or “in seven days,” hinting that the choice might be altered sooner rather than later.
He continued by saying, “Same doxing rules apply to ‘journalists’ as to everyone else,” referring to publishing private information about people online. The suspensions were deemed “questionable and unfortunate” by a spokesman for the New York Times. The suspensions follow Mr. Musk’s threat to file a lawsuit against the proprietor of a profile that tracks his private jet.
He claimed that a “crazy stalker” had tracked down and approached a car carrying his kids in Los Angeles using live location sharing.
Following the suspensions, the German Foreign Office warned Twitter that “press freedom cannot be turned off and on at will.”
A town square
In a $44 billion ($36 billion) deal, Mr. Musk acquired control of Twitter in October.
After successfully acquiring the website, the billionaire told advertisers that he did so to “try to help humanity” so that “civilization would have a digital town square.”
He has altered many of its moderation procedures. Some civil rights organizations are concerned about the actions and accuse the billionaire of taking measures that will increase abuse, misinformation, and hate speech. The EU adopted the new Digital Services Act earlier this year, which may be used to enforce any penalties levied on Mr. Musk’s firm due to the account suspensions. According to the proposed new regulation, EU Commission would have the right to penalize a corporation up to 6% of its global sales if it is found to violate its standards.
In extreme cases, the EU may request a court to stop a service if it is “refusing to comply with key duties and so risking people’s lives and safety.” A Mashable writer named Matt Binder, one of those who had been suspended insisted he had no clue why he had been blocked.
He admitted to the BBC, “I’ve been very critical of Musk in my reporting.” He clarified, however, that it was untrue that Mr. Musk had claimed “that everyone that got suspended was doxxing him – due to the jet tracker.” Even though the account had been suspended, he claimed he had never tweeted a link to the tracker.
Hundreds of accounts are tweeting the link every minute, so it is obvious that the suspended individuals were hand-picked. Mr. Binder, who has been reporting on the developments on Twitter since 2008, expressed his surprise at the prohibition on journalists.
I was aware it was a possibility, but I didn’t think he would because it would completely shatter the pretense that the platform was a place for free speech. Ben Collins, an NBC News disinformation reporter, was removed from broadcasts due to his tweets earlier this month that was critical of Elon Musk, it was revealed on Friday.
On Twitter Spaces, a social media app feature that enables live audio conversations, Mr Musk later spoke with journalists. However, after responding to a few inquiries about the ban, he left, and Twitter Spaces has since appeared to be suspended.
Since Elon Musk’s takeover, Mastodon, which has become a Twitter alternative, has also had its official account suspended by Twitter.
It also appeared that links to specific Mastodon accounts were prohibited. Users were informed via an error message that links to Mastodon had been “identified” by Twitter or its partners as “potentially harmful.”
