Brussels, Belgium - Elon Musk is in trouble with the EU again as the European Commission announced on Monday legal steps against X over the spread of disinformation and transparency breaches.

Other alleged shortcomings include breaches in the obligation to counter the dissemination of illegal content, the use of deceptive design, and failures to provide data access for researchers, the commission said.

"We take any breach of our rules very seriously. And the evidence we currently have is enough to formally open a proceeding against X," said EU Commission Vice-President Margrethe Vestager.

Under a recent EU law, called the Digital Services Act (DSA), platforms with more than 45 million active users are subject to far-reaching content moderation rules.

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This applies to major social media including X, Facebook, and TikTok.

Infringements of the DSA can result in fines. For designated companies, financial penalties can be up to 6% of global turnover. In exceptional circumstances, with a court order, a company can be temporarily shut down.

"The Commission will carefully investigate X's compliance with the DSA, to ensure European citizens are safeguarded online – as the regulation mandates," Vestager said.

"Today's opening of formal proceedings against X makes it clear that, with the DSA, the time of big online platforms behaving like they are 'too big to care' has come to an end," EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton said.

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"We invite X to cooperate with us in this investigation," said a European Commission spokesman, adding that the case against X is the first such investigation under the DSA.

The commission had sent the social media company a formal request for information in October, several days after the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, demanding answers on the alleged spread of illegal content and disinformation.