Elon Musk’s
The settlement ends Musk’s aggressive attempts to hold advertisers liable for siphoning spending from X over brand safety concerns.
X sued WFA in 2024, accusing it of conducting a “systematic illegal boycott” of the platform after advertising revenue declined following Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of the social network in 2022. Company X included Mars, CVS Health, Shell, Lego, and others. Advertisers dismissed these claims and insisted that brands were free to decide where to spend their advertising dollars.
A federal court dismissed the lawsuit in March after a judge said X failed to prove it suffered harm under federal competition law. X appealed the decision last April.
“Today, the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) and X Corp. are filing a lawsuit involving the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM),” the joint statement reads. “This resets the relationship between the two organizations.”
X claimed advertisers had reduced their spending because of guidelines developed by the WFA’s Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), a coalition of brands and advertising agencies set up to develop standards to prevent ads from appearing alongside harmful online content.
Advertisers feared their brands would appear alongside harmful content on the social network after Musk overhauled the platform’s content moderation policies.
“The WFA reiterates its commitment to freedom of the press, a principle first included in the WFA’s founding constitution in 1953 and a principle it shares with X.” “On August 9, 2024, WFA discontinued GARM. WFA will not form or relaunch GARM or similar initiatives. WFA and X are fully aligned on the view that brands, platforms and consumers will all benefit from brand safety innovation.”
The lawsuit wasn’t Musk’s only clash with advertisers. After acquiring X, he told advertisers who stopped spending on the platform to “fuck themselves.”
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