Twitter to provide fake account data to Elon Musk

Solène Leroux with AFP 9:38 a.m., June 9, 2022, modified at 9:38 a.m., June 9, 2022

Twitter's board finally relented, according to the

, and now plans to give Elon Musk access to the mountains of data needed to answer his questions about the number of fake accounts.

On Monday, the boss of Tesla threatened in an official document to withdraw his offer to acquire the social network which, according to him, "actively resists" his requests for information on spam and robotic accounts, which the platform refuted.

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But the council of the Californian group should provide the multi-billionaire "a flood of data including some 500 million tweets published each day", perhaps as early as this week, according to an article from the American daily published on Wednesday.

The

bases this information on an anonymous source familiar with the negotiations.

Contacted by AFP, Twitter declined to comment.

$44 billion takeover bid

Elon Musk filed a takeover bid for Twitter in April for $44 billion, after many twists and turns, from his entry into the capital, which took shareholders by surprise, to his many very critical messages from the social network.

In mid-May, he announced that he was suspending the agreement with the board of directors (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 and on the measures taken to limit its proliferation.

A lawyer for the San Francisco-based company told employees Wednesday that the deal was still ongoing, and that a shareholder vote to approve the acquisition would take place in late July or early August, according to the agency. Bloomberg press.

The buyout agreement obliges the entrepreneur to complete the transaction, unless he can prove that the social network cheated him or that a major event changes his value.

Both parties have pledged to pay severance pay of up to $1 billion in certain circumstances.

Musk wants to conduct his "own analysis"

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 claims that the methodology used by the platform is not "adequate" and that he must conduct his "own analysis".

If the board of directors gives him access to all the information, "it will end this major impasse," commented analyst Dan Ives on Twitter.

According to a report by the Washington Post, Twitter's board will comply with Elon Musk's demands for data on bot and spam accounts.

Our thoughts: this would end the major standoff between Musk and the Board on this hot button issue which has paused the deal.

— Dan Ives (@DivesTech) June 8, 2022

On the New York Stock Exchange, Twitter's stock hovered around $40 on Wednesday, a far cry from the $54.20 price offered by the world's richest man in April.