Henna Virkkunen denies taking a softer approach to Big Tech when Trump returns

A senior EU official has ruled out a softer approach to Big Tech, citing a “very clear legal basis” for regulators and reports of several investigations into the social media platform. X and Meta.

FT notify earlier this week that the EU was reviewing the investigations the apple, google and Meta, a process that could ultimately lead the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, to change or reduce the focus of their probes.

However, speaking to CNBC on Thursday, Henna Virkkunen, the European Commission’s executive vice president for technological sovereignty, pushed back.

“We have our Digital Services Law that came into force a little over a year ago, and various formal procedures are underway, we can say, against all the big platforms: Meta platforms, Instagram, Facebook, X and X too. With TikTok” , said Virkkunen.

“We continue with the work, so no new decisions have been made. So we are doing investigations (to see) if they comply with our rules,” he said.

The Digital Services Law or the DSA, which came into force in 2024, gives EU institutions the power to regulate Big Tech to prevent illegal and harmful activities online and to reduce disinformation.

Despite these new powers, however, there are growing questions about how the EU will actually enforce the rules, especially after President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House.

“It remains to be seen what the EU will do, as some investigations have gone further than others, but it is clear that US tech companies will try to use the Trump administration to roll back EU rules,” Dexter Thillien, senior analyst. at the Economist Intelligence Unit, he told CNBC.

comes as technological industry attempts comfortable Trump before his second term as president. Tesla’s Elon Musk, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Zuckerberg will do it Go to Trump’s inauguration next week, according to NBC news.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, meanwhile, called on the incoming US president to review the EU’s approach to Big Tech, saying the way the bloc applies competition rules is “almost like a tariff”.

EU official Virkkunen is one of a new group of politicians who started working as members of the EU executive in December. So far, the bloc has been considered a leader in technology regulation and has opened the door to several probes into the behavior of Big Tech companies.

Asked if he was considering taking a softer approach to the sector, Virkkunen said: “We have very clear legal and regulatory frameworks in Europe, and of course we are now fully complying with those rules.”

Virkkunen did not say whether he felt pressured by Trump’s return to the White House. Instead, he said, “all companies, whether American, European or Chinese, must respect EU regulations.”

In December 2023, it was Musk’s X It hit the EU’s first probe According to the Digital Services Act. It is the European Commission X breached transparency obligations and obligations to combat illegal content.

At the time, the organization said it was specifically evaluating areas related to risk management, content moderation, dark patterns, advertising transparency and data access for researchers.

As Musk continues judge the far right before the German elections — including hosting live discussion Alice Weidel with the head of the AfD party – there are questions as part of the investigation that the European Commission will evaluate this conversation.

“This is not about Elon Musk. It’s about Xi,” Virkkunen said.

“X (a) is a very big online platform, they have to take their responsibilities, and they have to assess and mitigate the risks, for example, what they publish for electoral processes and civil discourse. But the (European) commission is already investigating X about it, and the investigation the scope is already quite large,” he said, adding that “we are constantly following up” on new developments.