Elon Musk's X has published its first transparency report since the rebranding from Twitter, detailing reported rule violations, content removal requests, and other enforcement actions taken during the first half of this year.

With X's updated content moderation approach, many have been analyzing the data to understand how Musk's more lenient stance has influenced user experience. However, in terms of total enforcement actions, the figures appear quite comparable to previous updates from Twitter.

To begin, X has shared an overview of the total enforcement actions it implemented in response to identified rule violations from January to June 2024.

In total, X reported suspending 5.2 million accounts in the first half of this year due to rule violations and removing 10.7 million posts for the same reasons. This marks a higher level of enforcement compared to Twitter's last transparency report, which covered the first half of 2022.

At that time, Twitter's team (before Elon Musk's ownership) reported removing 6.6 million posts and taking action against 5 million accounts, although only 1.6 million accounts were suspended for violations, significantly fewer than X's recent figures.

In the first half of 2021, Twitter stated that it had removed 5.9 million tweets and took action against 4.8 million accounts, suspending 1.2 million of those profiles.

Overall, X is removing significantly more content and suspending more accounts despite its new, more lenient moderation policies. This shift likely reflects a greater reliance on automation due to a reduced staff, leading X to adopt a more binary approach to rule violations. As a result, accounts that might have previously received warnings to remove content are now being suspended more readily.

Interestingly, the number of accounts suspended and actions taken is closely aligned, with X removing nearly double the amount of content compared to Twitter’s previous enforcement statistics.

However, the results may not align with what many expected. 

According to X's data, users reported 81 million incidents of abuse and harassment during this period, along with 66 million cases of hate speech. Of those incidents, only 1.35% of the accounts reported for abusive behavior were suspended, and a mere 0.004% of those posting hate speech were removed. While millions of hate speech posts were deleted, X is now much less likely to suspend users for such actions.

In 2022, 111,000 profiles were suspended for hateful conduct, compared to just 2,300 in this report.

On a more positive note, X suspended over 2 million more accounts for child safety than it did in 2022, along with around 400,000 additional actions against "deceptive entities."

However, the platform is taking less action against content related to suicide and self-harm, suspending only 2,000 accounts compared to 11,000 in 2022.

Regarding legal requests, X received 72,000 legal action requests in the first half of the year, complying with 70% of them.

In 2022, Twitter received 53,000 legal requests, down from 43,387 in 2021. The platform had previously complied with approximately 54% of these requests.

Overall, despite Elon Musk's assertions of a more open and "free speech"-oriented platform, X is actually removing more content, suspending more users, and responding to more legal requests than Twitter did. However, its policies now appear to allow users who promote hate speech to remain active, while enforcement against self-harm content seems to have weakened.

This situation isn't particularly surprising. X has made it clear that it is now leaning more towards reach restrictions rather than account suspensions and content removals, and Musk has publicly opposed certain government directives while complying with others.

The data reflects this shift; however, it also indicates that X is enforcing stricter measures overall, even with this approach.

Whether this is a better situation for the platform is debatable. Advertisers certainly don't seem to think so, and one might question if this truly aligns with a "free speech" philosophy compared to the previous management at Twitter.

It appears that the former Twitter team was less likely to suspend accounts in general, allowing for more opportunities for correction instead of resorting to binary bans.

Alternatively, X might simply be attracting a higher volume of posts that align with its current enforcement focus.

This strategy does seem riskier overall, but it is fascinating to observe the differences in X’s moderation tactics compared to its predecessor.