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X refused to remove violent video of Australian knife attack that was viewed by Southport killer minutes before murders, says regulator
Social media platform X refused to remove a violent video that was viewed by Axel Rudakubana minutes before he murdered three young children, despite demands to do so by online safety authorities in Australia and the UK.
Australian internet regulator eSafety said it noted with “great sadness” that the video of the stabbing of a bishop in Sydney last April was viewed by Rudakubana even though the regulator had repeatedly requested that it be removed.
Immediately after the attack in Sydney companies including Google, Microsoft, Snap and TikTok “acted quickly” to remove the video, eSafety said.
“X Corp chose not to remove the video from its platform.”
Violent content
Instead, X geoblocked the video for Australian users, meaning those in other countries or those using VPNs from within Australia could view it.
The move met with criticism from the Australian prime minister, but X said Australian rules should not be applied globally.
Rudakubana, 18, was sentenced to life with a minimum of 52 years in prison last week for the murder of the three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport.
The killings led to violent riots across the UK which were amplified by far-right posts on social media, some of which were amplified by X owner Elon Musk.
The court last week heard that Rudakubana deleted his entire browsing history apart from one search six minutes before he left to carry out the attack.
That was a search on X for the video of the stabbing three months earlier, police said.
As of Monday the video was still available on X, as was Rudakubana’s X profile.
Content rules
eSafety in June ended its efforts to force X to remove the video, as it carried out a broader review of its social media regulations.
The regulator found X had taken reasonable steps to stop the video from being viewed in Australia.
UK home secretary Yvette Cooper said the government was contacting X to ask it to remove the video.
“Companies should not be profiting from hosting content that puts children’s lives at risk,” she told the House of Commons last week.
X has been repeatedly criticised by regulators in the UK, the US, the EU and elsewhere over its rollback of content moderation under Musk’s ownership.
But following the election of Musk’s political ally Donald Trump in November, X competitor Meta Platforms made similar moves to end fact-checking in the US and scale back content moderation.
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