Mark Zuckerberg was warned by the EU over the spread of misinformation on Meta’s social media platforms following Hamas’ attack on Israel.

A European law requires it to respond and comply with European law within 24 hours, according to Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.

There has been an increase in misinformation about the conflict on social media, including doctored images and mislabeled videos.

A warning about such content was issued by the EU on Tuesday to X, formerly known as Twitter.

According to Thierry Breton, the bloc’s industry chief, it must show it has taken “timely, diligent and objective action”.

His letter said the company had 24 hours to inform him of the “proportionate and effective” measures it had taken to counter disinformation.

In response to the terrorist attacks by Hamas on Israel on Saturday, Meta quickly established a special operations center staffed with experts, including fluent Hebrew and Arabic speakers.

We work around the clock to keep our platforms safe, take action on content that violates our policies or local law, and coordinate with third-party fact checkers in the region to prevent misinformation from spreading. We will continue to work on this as the conflict unfolds.”

In the meantime, the European Commission reminded social media companies that they are legally required to prevent the spread of harmful content about Hamas, a proscribed terrorist group in the EU.

A spokesperson for the Commission confirmed that online content linked to Hamas qualifies as terrorist content, is illegal, and must be removed.