A bid by Elon Musk’s X, previously referred to as Twitter, to temporarily suspend a California law requiring social media platforms to disclose their terms of service and furnish semiannual reports to the state government regarding the moderation of content has now been struck down by a judge.
X filed a lawsuit against California Attorney General Rob Bonta (D) following the enactment of AB 587, which mandates that social media companies reveal their terms of service and provide reports demonstrating that their content moderation efforts are concentrated on eliminating hate speech, racism, extremism, disinformation, and harassment.
“The legislative record is crystal clear that one of the main purposes of AB 587 — if not the main purpose — is to pressure social media companies to eliminate or minimize content that the government has deemed objectionable,” a legal complain from the X company stated.
The organization argued that the regulation’s mandate regarding the moderation of expression violated the First Amendment.
Additionally, Shubb refuted claims that section 230 of the Communication Decency Act, which has provided legal protection to social media platforms as third-party publishers for years, supersedes the law.
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