Hate speech watchdog CEO responds to Elon Musk X lawsuit
The Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Imran Ahmed said the lawsuit has produced a ‘chilling effect’ across the civil rights sector.
The head of an online hate-speech watchdog has spoken out against Elon Musk after the business tycoon's X Corp., the parent company of the social media app formerly known as Twitter, filed a lawsuit against the nonprofit.
In a lawsuit filed Monday in California, X Corp. claimed The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) published "misleading claims" and exaggerated the prevalence of harmful content on X to thwart investment from advertisers.
X Corp. said the "scare campaign" was accomplished by illegally scraping data and cherry-picking inflammatory posts to support the CCDH's thesis about hate speech on the platform.
During a Tuesday appearance on "CNN This Morning," CCDH CEO Imran Ahmed stood by the group's reports on X. He said they have been "incredibly transparent" about the methodology used to support their claims.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Imran Ahmed said Tuesday on CNN that the lawsuit filed by Elon Musk's company X has produced a "chilling effect" across the civil rights sector. (CNN/Screenshot)
Ahmed also reaffirmed that Twitter saw an increase in hate speech around the time that Musk took over.
"The truth is that [Musk's] been casting around for a reason to blame us for his own failings as a CEO, because we all know that when he took over, he put up the bat signal to racists, to misogynists, to homophobes, to anti-Semites, saying Twitter is now a free speech platform. He welcomed them back on," Ahmed said.
Speaking to one of the studies, Ahmed revealed the CCDH took 100 random tweets containing "hate" from Twitter Blue accounts and reported it to the platform using the site's internal tools.
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Elon Musk, billionaire and chief executive officer of Tesla, at the Viva Tech fair in Paris, France, on Friday, June 16, 2023. (Nathan Laine/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
He claimed that in 99 out of 100 cases, Twitter, now known as X, failed to enforce their community standards on the posts.
"All we do is hold up a mirror to the platform and ask them to consider whether or not they like the reflection they see in it," Ahmed continued. "Never before has one of these social media companies, and we, of course, analyze all social media companies without fear or favor. But when others don't like the reflection, they seek to change it. What Mr. Musk has done is said, I'm going to sue the mirror because I don't like what I see inside it."
When asked what impact the lawsuit could have on watchdog groups, Ahmed also said the lawsuit would have "a chilling effect" across the civil rights sector.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, Ahmed said Musk will "stop at nothing" to silence those who criticize his decisions and actions, noting that the latest legal threat is "straight out of the authoritarian playbook."
Ahmed also said that their research shows hate and disinformation on the platform is "spreading like wildfire" under Musk's ownership.
"People don’t want to see or be associated with hate, antisemitism, and the dangerous content that we all see proliferating on X. Musk is trying to ‘shoot the messenger’ who highlights the toxic content on his platform rather than deal with the toxic environment he’s created. The CCDH’s independent research won’t stop - Musk will not bully us into silence," he added.
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Twitter has rebranded to X, upsetting some social media users. (Monika Skolimowska/picture alliance via Getty Images)
In a Monday blog post, the CCDH said the legal threats from X are a "brazen attempt to silence honest criticism and independent research."
"CCDH believes the public has a right to know about the spread of hate and misinformation on the social media platforms that shape our lives, culture, and politics," the group added.
Twitter did not immediately return Fox News Digital's request for comment.
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