Twitter takes more steps to clamp down abuse and hate

Twitter is also singling out and collapsing potentially abusive and "low-quality" replies so only the most relevant conversations surface. 

 

Twitter is broadening its campaign to clamp down on hate speech and abuse.

The company said Tuesday that it has begun identifying people who have been banned for abusive behavior and will stop them from creating new accounts. It is also creating a ‘safe search’ feature that removes tweets with potentially sensitive content and tweets from blocked and muted accounts from search results. The tweets will still exist on Twitter if people look for them, but won’t appear in general search results.
Twitter is also singling out and collapsing potentially abusive and “low-quality” replies so only the most relevant conversations surface. These replies will also be accessible to those who seek them out, but Twitter is making them less visible.
Twitter’s Ed Ho, in a series of tweets, had earlier indicated the company is preparing to roll out updates that will make the platform a safer place. He said Twitter is moving with more urgency than ever and thinking about progress in ‘days and hours not week and months’. Ho talked about how Twitter’s primary focus will be to unveil fixes to mute/block and stop repeat offenders from creating accounts.
Twitter, which is struggling to boost user growth on its platform, has long been criticised as a hotbed for online harassment. The updates are supposed to bring down the number of such cases. Twitter earlier unveiled its mute feature for notifications to tackle online abuse. It also introduced a more direct way to report abuse. However, the company notes the announcements won’t suddenly remove abusive conduct from Twitter.