Twitter could be banned from the European Union if the social network does not comply with European rules, warned the French Minister responsible for digital, Jean-Noël Barrot. “Twitter, if it does not comply with our rules, will be banned, in the event of a repeat offense, from the European Union”, hammered on France Info Jean-Noël Barrot, Minister Delegate in charge of the Digital Transition and Telecommunications. The statement comes after Twitter officially released the European Union’s code of practice against online disinformation, announced by EU Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton on Saturday.
The latter had recalled in a message on Twitter that the social network, led by American billionaire Elon Musk, remained legally subject to compliance with European rules. “Twitter plays an important role in public debate, but we cannot risk a social network like Twitter being held hostage by proponents of disinformation and therefore our public debate, our democracy be affected,” insisted Jean-Noël Barrot. “That’s why we’ve made clear rules and Twitter will have to abide by them,” he added.
Asked about the future European regulations on generative artificial intelligence (the “IA Act”) currently under discussion, the French minister, while recognizing the need to “give a framework” to the development of AI, tackled the position of the European Parliament which risks “taking the European Union out of technological history”.
“At this stage, the position of the European Parliament is excessive, because it imposes audit obligations, transparency obligations which are excessive for this type of models”, like ChatGPT, he said. These AI models “are in a frantic race in which we must not fall behind or we will lock ourselves into decades of technological subjugation and dependence,” he continued, calling to “invest” in the field.
“It is imperative to have in the coming months models such as those developed by these American giants”, he concluded, recalling that Google had for the moment given up deploying its AI Bard in the EU in the face of regulatory constraints.
