Australian Court Fines Elon Musk’s X Over Child Safety Failures

CANBERRA – An Australian Federal Court has ordered Elon Musk’s social media platform, X Corp, to pay a fine of AU650,000 (US465,000), ending a bitter three-year legal showdown over the platform’s compliance with child internet safety regulations.

​The ruling, delivered on Thursday, May 21, concludes an enforcement battle initiated by Australia’s online safety regulator, the eSafety Commissioner. The watchdog had demanded detailed reports in February 2023 explaining how the platform—then operating as Twitter—was actively mitigating the spread of child sexual abuse material online.

​Following the platform’s subsequent acquisition by Elon Musk and its integration into X Corp, regulators flagged the company’s mandatory transparency responses as legally incomplete. X Corp aggressively resisted the notices in court, arguing that the corporate transition exempted it from the original reporting requirements issued to Twitter Inc.

​However, the Federal Court rejected that defense in October 2024, a decision later solidified by a full appellate court review in July 2025. Facing persistent pressure, X Corp ultimately admitted to the regulatory contraventions, acknowledging a 38-day window of ongoing non-compliance during its turbulent corporate restructuring period.

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​In his written judgment, Federal Justice Michael Wheelahan imposed a penalty sitting just short of the statutory maximum, explicitly warning multi-billion-dollar tech conglomerates against treating regulatory fines as minor operational expenses.

​“A penalty near the maximum is appropriate in the case of the respondent, which is a substantial corporation, so that it operates as a real deterrent and is not simply a cost of doing business,” Justice Wheelahan stated. Alongside the primary civil penalty, X Corp has been ordered to pay AU$100,000 to cover the regulator’s accumulated legal fees within the next 45 days.

​The legal victory provides significant momentum to Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, who has faced public broadsides from Musk over digital censorship boundaries. “Meaningful transparency is critical to holding technology companies to account,” Inman Grant said in a statement following the verdict. “This provides the Australian public with important information about how these companies are tackling the worst-of-the-worst content on their platforms.”

​The judicial outcome unfolds as Australia cements its position as a global pioneer in digital platform liability. Canberra recently enacted a world-first legislative ban prohibiting children under the age of 16 from using mainstream social networks such as Instagram and TikTok.

​According to diplomatic briefing documents, the strict legislative model has sparked significant international interest, with officials from Israel, the United Kingdom, Norway, and New Zealand initiating formal discussions with Australian policymakers to explore replicating similar youth-focused age restrictions in their home markets.