Australian Court Orders Elon Musk’s X to Pay a Fine in a Child Abuse Case

An Australian court endorsed an order on Friday for Elon Musk’s X to pay a fine of $418,000 (A$610,500) for failing to cooperate with a regulator’s request for information about anti-child abuse practices.

The Federal Court has ruled X Corp needs to cooperate with an Australian child sexual abuse transparency notice issued to the Social media giant, Twitter.

X had challenged that fine but the Federal Court of Australia ruled it was obliged to respond to the notice from the eSafety commissioner. The eSafety commissioner took the matter to the Federal court after X Corp challenged the fine in September 2023.

Elon Musk took X, then called Twitter in 2022. The X Corp had argued that it was not bound to respond to the notice in early 2023 since it was folded into a new Musk-controlled corporate entity.

The eSafety commissioner, Julie Imman said in a statement whether X Corp’s argument was accepted by the Court. She also added that 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.

The eSafety has also started civil proceedings against X due to its non-compliance.

However, X didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday. This is not the first conflict between Elon Musk and the Australian Internet Safety Regulator. This year, the eSafety commissioner ordered x earlier to remove posts showing a bishop in Australia being stabbed during a homily.

X challenged the order by the court based on that a regulator of one country should not decide what internet users would watch around the world. Ultimately, X kept the posts up following the Australian Regulator withdrew its case.