Elon Musk to buy Twitter: Twitter to provide fake account data to billionaire
Sylvie Claire / June 9, 2022
Twitter's board of directors finally relented, according to the Washington Post, and now plans to give Elon Musk access to the data montages needed to answer his questions about the number of fake accounts.
On Monday, the Tesla boss threatened in an official document to withdraw his offer to acquire the social network that, according to him, actively resists his requests for information on spam and robotic accounts, which the platform refuted.
But the California-based group's board is expected to provide the multibillionaire with a stream of data that includes the estimated 500 million tweets posted each day, possibly as early as this week, according to an article in the U.S. daily on Wednesday. The Washington Post bases this information on an anonymous source, aware of the negotiations. Contacted by AFP, Twitter refused to comment.
Elon Musk submitted a bid to buy Twitter for $44 billion in April, after numerous twists and turns, from his unexpected entry into the capital to a series of highly critical messages from the social network. In mid-May, he announced that he was suspending the agreement with the board (before reaffirming his intention to buy the platform), citing his doubts about the data transmitted by Twitter on spam and fake accounts, as well as the measures taken to limit their proliferation.
The buyout agreement obliges the entrepreneur to complete the transaction, unless he or she can prove that the social network has not deceived him or her or that a major event changes its value.
Both parties have agreed to pay a break-up fee of up to $1 billion under certain circumstances.
Twitter estimates that the number of fake accounts and spam on the social network represents less than 5% of its daily active users. But Elon Musk says that the methodology used by the platform is not adequate and that he needs to conduct his own analysis.