IBM and EU Take a Stand: No Ads on Elon Musk’s X Amid Antisemitism Controversy

Concerns about ads appearing alongside pro-Nazi content and hate speech on social media platform X have led advertisers to withdraw from the site. The owner, billionaire Elon Musk, has further exacerbated tensions by endorsing an antisemitic conspiracy theory through his tweets.

IBM said this week it stopped advertising on X after a report said its ads ran alongside Nazi-glorifying material — another setback as the platform, formerly known as Twitter, tries to win back big brands and their ad dollars, X’s main source of revenue.

The liberal advocacy organization Media Matters said in a report on Thursday that ads from Apple, Oracle, NBCUniversal’s Bravo network and Comcast were also placed next to X’s anti-Semitic material.

“IBM has zero tolerance for hate speech and discrimination, and we have immediately suspended all advertising on X while we investigate this completely unacceptable situation,” the company said in a statement.

Apple, Oracle, NBCUniversal and Comcast did not immediately respond to requests for comment on their next steps.

Separately, the European Union’s executive body announced on Friday that it would suspend advertising on X and other social media platforms in part because of an increase in hate speech.

Musk caused an uproar this week with his own tweets responding to a user who accused Jews of hating white people and being indifferent to anti-Semitism. “You have told the real truth,” Musk tweeted in response on Wednesday.

Musk has been accused of tolerating anti-Semitic messages on the platform since his purchase last year, and X’s content has gained increased attention since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.

“We strongly condemn this blatant promotion of anti-Semitic and racist hatred, which goes against our core values as Americans,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said Friday in response to Musk’s tweet.

X CEO Linda Yaccarino said X’s “view has always been very clear that discrimination against everyone should STOP everywhere.”

“I think we can and should all agree on that,” he tweeted on Thursday.

Musk hired Yaccarino, a former NBCUniversal executive, to rebuild relationships with advertisers who fled after his takeover. He worried that relaxing his content restrictions allowed hateful and toxic speech to flourish and damage their brands.

“Regarding this platform, X has also been very clear about our efforts to combat anti-Semitism and discrimination. It has no place anywhere in the world – it’s ugly and wrong. Full stop,” Yaccarino said.

The accounts found by Media Matters posting anti-Semitic material are no longer commercializable, and certain posts are marked as “sensitive media,” according to X’s statement. Musk, however, denounced Media Matters as an “evil organization.”

The head of the Anti-Defamation League also took issue with Musk’s tweets this week in the latest clash between a prominent Jewish civil rights organization and the billionaire businessman.

“At a time when anti-Semitism is exploding in America and spreading around the world, it is undeniably dangerous to use one’s influence to strengthen and advance anti-Semitic theories,” ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said in X.

Musk also tweeted this week that he was “deeply offended by the messages of the ADL and any other group that actually promotes anti-white or anti-Asian racism or racism of any kind.”

The group has previously accused Musk of allowing anti-Semitism and hate speech to spread on forums and amplify the messages of neo-Nazis and white supremacists who want to ban the ADL.

Meanwhile, the European Commission said it had suspended all its social media advertising because of an “alarming increase in disinformation and hate speech” on the platforms in recent weeks.

The commission, the 27-nation EU’s executive body, said it was advising its departments to “at this stage refrain from advertising on social media platforms with such content”, adding that its official accounts on X would not be affected by the freeze.

The EU has taken a tough line with new rules to clean up social media platforms, and last month it issued a formal request to X for information on its handling of hate speech, disinformation and violent terrorist content related to the Israel-Hamas war.

X is not alone with problematic content after the conflict.

TikTok on Thursday removed the hashtag #lettertoamerica after users of the app posted sympathetic videos of Osama bin Laden’s 2002 letter justifying Americans against 9/11. September terrorist attacks and criticized US support for Israel. The Guardian, which published a transcript of the letter to be shared, removed it and replaced it with a statement directing readers to a news article from 2002 that it said provided more context.

The videos attracted widespread attention among X users who criticized TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance. TikTok said the letter was not trending on its platform and blamed editor Yashar Ali’s X post and media coverage for sparking more engagement with the hashtag.

The short-form video app has been criticized by Republicans and others who say the platform has failed to protect Jewish users from harassment and push pro-Palestinian content to viewers.

TikTok has aggressively pushed back, saying it has removed anti-Semitic content and is not manipulating its algorithm to take sides.