EU fines X $140 million over ‘deceptive’ blue checkmarks

The European Union has served Elon Musk’s X with a €120 million (about $140 million) penalty for violating the bloc’s digital service rulebook, in part for the “deceptive design” of its blue checkmark. Today’s announcement marks the first time that a company has been fined under the landmark Digital Services Act (DSA) law for curbing “illegal and harmful activities” on online platforms, and follows the EU launching a multifaceted investigation into X in December 2023.

In July 2024, the EU ruled that X was failing to comply with obligations around advertising transparency, data access for researchers, and “dark patterns” — deceptive interface features designed to trick users. X’s blue checkmark system was specifically called out for deceiving users by allowing anyone to pay to be “verified,” making it harder to determine the authenticity of X accounts. In today’s announcement, the European Commission noted that while the DSA doesn’t require user verification, “it clearly prohibits online platforms from falsely claiming that users have been verified.”

“Deceiving users with blue checkmarks, obscuring information on ads and shutting out researchers have no place online in the EU,” the bloc’s tech chief Henna Virkkunen said in a statement. “The DSA protects users. The DSA gives researchers the way to uncover potential threats. The DSA restores trust in the online environment. With the DSA’s first non-compliance decision, we are holding X responsible for undermining users’ rights and evading accountability.”

The EU can charge companies up to 6 percent of their global revenue for DSA violations. As X is a private company — purchased by Musk for $44 billion in October 2022 and again by his artificial intelligence company, X AI, in March 2025 for $33 billion — it’s unclear what its potential maximum penalty could have been. X can appeal the fine, but now has 60 working days to inform the EU of the measures it will take to change the “deceptive” use of blue checkmarks, and 90 days for its planned fixes for the other violations. Failure to meet those deadlines could result in more penalty payments.

European lawmakers had deliberated how large a fine to issue according to The New York Times, reporting that regulators sought to make an example of X as a warning to other companies while weighing the risks of sparking retaliation from President Donald Trump amid ongoing trade disputes. Musk, alongside the leadership of other US tech giants, has encouraged the president to stop the EU from taking advantage of US companies.

The 2023 investigation was also launched to scrutinize X’s moderation practices and the dissemination of illegal or harmful content on the platform, which is currently still ongoing and could incur further penalties.

The EU has criticized X over rising levels of disinformation following its acquisition by Musk. In January, EU lawmakers pledged to “energetically” push the X investigation forward over concerns with Musk’s promotion of Germany’s far-right party leader on the platform. Musk has used X to rally behind other far-right personalities and sparked outrage after pulling a controversial gesture during his speech at Trump’s inauguration.