Elon Musk Threatens Legal Action Against Research Group Over Twitter Hate Speech Findings

Musk’s Aggressive Campaign Against CCDH

“Musk and his legal team, led by attorney Alex Spiro at Quinn Emanuel, have engaged in an aggressive campaign to intimidate, bully, and silence CCDH,” the organization said in a statement released Monday. “While Elon Musk proclaims to be a ‘free speech absolutist,’ his actions against CCDH show the lengths he will go to silence those who seek to hold him to account.”

CCDH’s Findings and Musk’s Response

The Center for Countering Digital Hate recently published findings that Twitter failed to take action against 99 of 100 Twitter Blue accounts the organization reported for hate-speech violations. A July 20 letter from Spiro to the organization called the CCDH’s research “false, misleading or both” and said X Corp. is “investigating whether CCDH’s false and misleading claims about Twitter are actionable” under U.S. law. In addition, he wrote, the company has “reason to believe” that the CCDH is “supported by funding from X Corp.’s commercial competitors, as well as government entities and their affiliates.”

“Twitter takes its commitment to free speech, the enforcement of its rules and policies protecting users, and its strong relationships with its advertising partners all extremely seriously… to the extent that CCDH is passing off as impartial ‘research’ material that is in fact being funded in support of an ulterior agenda, your representations are all the more misleading,” Spiro’s letter said.

Musk, in a post Monday about the legal dispute, wrote, “Let’s pull the mask off this organization and see who is really behind it.”

CCDH’s Response

In a letter dated July 31 to Spiro from Roberta Kaplan of Kaplan Hecker & Fink, which is representing CCDH, wrote that the research group “will not be bullied by your clients.” Kaplan’s letter did not address the group’s sources of funding but said, “Your assertion that the goal in CCDH’s research and reporting is to benefit Twitter’s competitors… ignores the fact that CCDH has published critical, highly publicized reports about other platforms, including Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.”

“Your clients, of course, are free to pursue litigation if they choose to do so,” Kaplan wrote. “But they should be mindful of the risks involved in bringing frivolous claims to intimidate thoughtful critics and stifle legitimate commentary on issues of clear public interest. And they should also know that CCDH is fully prepared to defend itself and its ability to continue pursuing its public mission.”

Possible Lawsuit and CCDH’s Stand

If X Corp./Twitter decides to sue CCDH, Kaplan added in the letter, “please be advised that CCDH intends to seek immediate discovery regarding hate speech and misinformation on the Twitter platform; Twitter’s policies and practices relating to these issues; and Twitter’s advertising revenue. In that event, a court will determine for itself the truth of the statements in our client’s report in accordance with the time-tested rules of civil procedure and evidence.”

In its response, the CCDH also noted that Musk, in posts on Twitter, has called the organization “evil” and CEO Imran Ahmed a “rat.”

CCDH’s Mission and Findings

“Elon Musk’s actions represent a brazen attempt to silence honest criticism and independent research, in the desperate hope that he can stem the tide of negative stories and rebuild his relationship with advertisers,” Imran Ahmed, CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, said in a statement. “Advertisers are fleeing his platform for one clear reason: Elon Musk has supported the proliferation of hate and racism on it, and he doesn’t care to stop it. Musk is targeting CCDH because we reveal the truth about the spread of hate and disinformation on Twitter under his ownership, and it’s impacting his bottom line. CCDH will continue to hold social media companies that spread hate and disinformation online accountable to the public.”

Among the Center for Countering Digital’s research into Twitter, it has found that the volume of tweets containing slurs have risen by up to 202% since Musk’s takeover of Twitter; the number of tweets linking LGBTQ+ people to “grooming” have more than doubled over that time; and that paid-for verification is “helping spread disinformation.”

Twitter’s Response and Measures

Twitter/X has claimed that hate speech occurs at extremely low rates on the platform, and estimates that hate speech impressions have declined 30% since Musk took over Twitter in October 2022. “More than 99% of content users and advertisers see on Twitter is healthy,” the Twitter/X Safety account said in a July 18 post.

According to Twitter/X, it has applied warning labels to more than 700,000 posts violated its hateful conduct policy since April and that it “proactively prevent[s] ads from appearing adjacent to content that we label.”

Twitter said that in March 2023, it partnered with social-media management vendor Sprinklr to “understand, measure and reduce hate speech using its AI-based model and to further our commitment to create a brand-safe environment for our agencies and advertisers.”

According to the company, Sprinklr’s independent model showed that daily English-language hate speech impressions are “even lower than Twitter’s own model estimates.” Sprinklr estimated the average daily number of hate speech impressions vs. overall impressions to be 0.003% compared with Twitter’s estimate of 0.012% for the period of Jan. 1-May 31, 2023.