Elon Musk’s X is ordered by an Australian court to pay a $418,000 fine for failing to comply with the Child Safety Regulator

Elon Musk’s X has been fined $418,000 by an Australian court for not assisting the nation’s child safety authority.

Elon Musk’s social media company X, formerly known as Twitter, was fined A$610,500 ($418,000) by an Australian court for not responding to the regulator’s request for information about anti-child abuse policies from Australia’s eSafety Commissioner. X had challenged the fine, claiming it was not required to reply; nonetheless, the Australian Federal Court decided in the regulator’s favor.

In early 2023, the eSafety Commissioner requested information from X regarding its efforts to combat child sexual exploitation material. However, X refused to deliver it. This is the main focus of the case. X’s legal team contended that the platform was no longer subject to the initial regulatory requirements since it had been merged into a new company under Musk’s ownership once he took it private in 2022.

While expressing satisfaction at the court’s ruling, eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant cautioned that if X’s argument had been successful, it may have created a risky precedent for businesses to use corporate restructuring as a means of evading regulatory monitoring.

Grant released a statement after the decision that stated, “Had X Corp’s argument been accepted by the Court it could have set the concerning precedent that a foreign company’s merger with another foreign company might enable it to avoid regulatory obligations in Australia.”

For X’s noncompliance, eSafety has filed a civil lawsuit in addition to the punishment. X has not yet responded to the court’s ruling.

Regulators in Australia and Musk’s X have previously battled. An Australian bishop was involved in a violent altercation earlier this year; X was asked to erase posts about it, but eventually refused. Musk denounced the directive as censorship, contending that no nation’s authority should control all internet content globally. He eventually decided to leave the messages up after the Australian regulator withdrew its complaint.

At the time, Musk claimed that the directive amounted to censorship and reposted posts portraying the worldwide order as a World Economic Forum conspiracy to impose global eSafety regulations.