Thierry Breton has overstepped his powers under the Digital Services Act by sending a formal notice to several social networks to respond within 24 hours regarding their management of content relating to the situation in Israel. The Commission, which now faces legal action from the platforms targeted in this way, tried to make up for the Commissioner’s blunder with a more measured statement yesterday evening. Under the Digital Services Act (DSA), can a European Commissioner send a public rebuke to a social network, and enjoin it to respond within 24 hours? Nothing is less certain, as we shall see. Yet this is exactly what Thierry Breton decided to do, on three occasions, exposing his institution to legal action. As a reminder, on October 10, he sent a letter to Elon Musk about X; on October 11, to Mark Zuckerberg about Meta; and on October 12, to Shou Zi Chew about TikTok. The accusations made in these letters are rather vague. Thierry Breton explains that « following the terrorist attacks carried out by Hamas against Israel, we have indications that your platform is being used to disseminate illegal content and disinformation in the EU ». He then implies that platforms have not complied with their obligations under the DSA to respond to the situation, without providing any precise indication of the violations invoked. In addition,…
