Twitter has reportedly closed its entire Brussels office, sparking fears about whether the platform will abide by Europe’s new rules on policing content online.
Citing five people familiar with the matter, the Financial Times newspaper reported on Thursday that Twitter’s European digital policy chiefs Dario La Nasa and Julia Mozer left the social media company last week.
The bureau is now closed after four other executives quit as part of mass redundancies earlier this month which removed around 7,500 staff.
Mozer and La Nasa led Twitter’s efforts to comply with the European Union’s Digital Services Act, which was implemented last week and sets new rules on how platforms should keep users safe online.
The former execs survived the initial job culls in early November but may have left after new Twitter boss Elon Musk’s ultimatum to commit to “hardcore working culture” and working long hours, or else leave the company with three months’ severance pay.
It is unclear, however, if they resigned or were made redundant.
The 51-year-old billionaire’s first two weeks as Twitter’s owner have been marked by a major overhaul and quick-fire decisions, including the dismissal of the company’s former CEO Parag Agrawal and approximately half of its staff.
The latest staff exits follow a similar trend of employees around the world leaving the company abruptly.
The results of a poll, taken after Musk’s ultimatum by workplace app Blind, showed 42 per cent of 180 of Twitter employees chose the answer “Taking exit option, I’m free!”
A quarter said they had chosen to stay “reluctantly,” and only 7 per cent of participants said they clicked “yes to stay, I’m hardcore”.
The SpaceX and Tesla boss, who finalised his $44 billion (€42 billion) purchase of Twitter last month, has raised concern over whether his platform will remain a safe space after he reversed bans on controversial figures such as former US president Donald Trump, while also pledging to relax content moderation rules.
Questions have also been raised as to if Musk will comply with the EU’s stricter data rules.
On Thursday, the European Commission showed that removals of hate speech by Twitter had dropped by about 5 per cent year on year.
Musk also postponed the relaunch of the Twitter Blue subscription service after the blue tick feature was used by impersonators on Twitter.
