Bluesky falling foul of EU rules by not reporting user numbers across the bloc

Bluesky, the social network that’s currently surging in popularity due to an exodus of users from rival X, is in breach of European Union (EU) regulations that stipulate all online platforms must regularly publish regional user numbers.

The Digital Services Act (DSA), which came into full effect back in February, is an online governance framework that’s designed to foster greater transparency and address illicit and toxic content across various online platforms, social networks, marketplaces and elsewhere. While platforms and intermediaries that have been designated as very large online platforms (VLOPs) face the strictest obligations, certain rules apply to all online service providers.

Indeed, Article 24 of the DSA requires all online platforms that serve the EU market to report regional user numbers twice a year “in a publicly available section of their online interface.” The social network formerly known as Twitter does exactly this, as does Meta, but it seems that Bluesky missed the memo, per a Financial Times report earlier on Monday.

Under the DSA, penalties that could be levied on platforms for information reporting failures can reach up to 1% of their global annual turnover.

Bluesky did recently self-report passing 20 million users globally. But to comply with the DSA it needs to break out EU users specifically, and disclose the information on its website using the EU’s twice yearly reporting protocol.

Currently Bluesky’s 20M global total clearly means the platform easily falls below the 45M monthly users threshold where it could be designated as a VLOP under the DSA. But since some of the regulation’s transparency disclosures apply to platforms generally the European Commission (EC) has written to Member States, where enforcement of the general rules typically happens — asking if “they can find any trace of Bluesky” in their country, such as an office that it can contact to request the relevant information.

“Article 24 of the Digital Services Act indeed requires all online platforms in the EU, including BlueSky, to report their user numbers twice a year (in February and August) on their own website,” European Commission (EC) spokesperson Thomas Regnier said in a statement issued to TechCrunch. “This helps the Commission to monitor market developments and potentially designate — or undesignate — platforms as [VLOPs] if they meet the threshold [of] 45 million monthly active users in the EU.”

TechCrunch has reached out to Bluesky for comment. We will update this report if we hear back.

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