Australia fires caught order at Elon Musk's X to takedown all terrorist attack videos

Australia's government recently declared a video that was making the rounds on social media platforms a "terrorist attack," which has resulted in Australia's eSafety Commissioner asking social platforms to remove the content in question.

Australia demanded social platforms respect its laws that prohibit social platforms from hosting any content that depicts a terrorist attack, with the eSafety Commissioner asking Elon Musk's X to remove the content of an Australian man attacking bishop Mari Emmanuel in Sydney, Australia. Australia's government defined the incident as a terrorist attack due to it involving religious or ideological violence.

Elon Musk's X responded by blocking the content for Australian users, but Christopher Tran, the barrister for the eSafety commissioner, argued this decision doesn't represent the removal of the posts, which violates Australian law. The eSafety Commissioner demanded that X remove global access to the content to abide by its laws, which Musk promptly responded to by vowing to challenge the requirement.

One of the issues the eSafety Commissioner faces is Australian's can simply use a VPN to bypass X's geo-located access to the terrorist content, but what percentage of Australian's actually using a VPN to look at the content remains unknown.

Musk has since taken to his personal X account with several posts about the debate between his social platform and seemingly over-reaching Australian law, asking public questions such as "Should the eSafety Commissar (an unelected official) in Australia have authority over all countries on Earth?"

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Musk was a "a bloke who's chosen ego and showing violence over common sense".

"Australians will shake their head when they think that this billionaire is prepared to go to court fighting for the right to sow division and to show violent videos," he told Sky News. "He is in social media, but he has a social responsibility in order to have that social licence."

Albanese said to ABC that Musk was "an arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law."