Musk's X faces EU complaints over use of sensitive user data for targeted advertising

Nine civil society groups have filed complaints with the European Commission and French media regulator Arcom, accusing Elon Musk’s platform X of using sensitive personal data for targeted advertising in possible violation of EU tech rules.

The groups said on Monday that X may be breaching the Digital Services Act, which prohibits advertising based on user data related to religion, race, sexual orientation, and other protected categories. They urged regulators to launch an investigation.

The complaints come after the groups reviewed X’s Ad Repository, a database made public under DSA rules. They said the data suggests that ads were targeted based on sensitive categories defined under Article 9 of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation.

The organisations include AI Forensics, Centre for Democracy and Technology Europe, Entropy, European Digital Rights, Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte, Global Witness, Panoptykon Foundation, Stichting Bits of Freedom, and VoxPublic.

The statement said the groups found that major brands, public institutions, and financial companies used X’s platform to deliver ads based on users’ political views, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, and health conditions.