X’s clapback came after the Commission fined it $140 million. The gesture appears to be toothless.
X says it slapped the European Commission with a ban on its X ad account over what it has deemed a rule violation. Coincidentally enough, the European Commission had just slapped that social media platform with a fine of about $140 Million a day earlier for alleged deceptiveness and lack of transparency, and for allegedly withholding necessary data disclosures.
But the European Commission says it doesn’t pay for ads on X anyway—a Commission policy that has stood for over two years.
According to an X post by X head of product Nikita Bier, the European Commission’s tweet announcing the fine was itself deceptive. Bier says there’s an exploit in the X ad composer, and that the European Commission used it “to post a link that deceives users into thinking it’s a video and to artificially increase its reach.”
The irony of your announcement:
You logged into your dormant ad account to take advantage of an exploit in our Ad Composer — to post a link that deceives users into thinking it’s a video and to artificially increase its reach.
As you may be aware, X believes everyone should… https://t.co/ziuhUOimOT
Nikita Bier (@nikitabier) December 6, 2025
The European Commission’s post does have a video in it:
Today, we fined X for non-compliance with transparency obligations under the DSA.
