Twitter adds new ways to curb abuse

Social media companies are under increasing scrutiny for the amount of hate speech that thrives on their platforms, especially since the presidential election.

Now, Twitter has unveiled several new measures to curb the online abuse, although the changes are unlikely to be far-reaching enough to quiet the company’s critics.

Recently, Twitter said it was making it easier for its users to hide content they do not wish to see on the service and to report abusive posts, even when those messages are directed at other users. The company has given its support teams training to better identify mistreatment on Twitter.

“There’s a fine line between free expression and abuse, and this launch is another step on the path toward getting rid of abuse,” said Del Harvey, Twitter’s vice president of trust and security. “We’ve been launching new products to address this, and the cadence of product releases is picking up. We have a lot planned on this path.”

Online harassment and hate speech have long festered on Twitter, but the incidents appeared to rise during the presidential campaign. Exchanges between supporters of President-elect Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton grew personal and acrimonious.

Twitter has not had a comprehensive response for dealing with hate speech, largely because the company did not want to limit freedom of expression on the service. But over time, Twitter has rolled out measures to tackle the problem. It has let people mute the accounts of other users, effectively making their content disappear from view. Last year, it issued an explicit prohibition against hateful conduct.

The company is now taking more action. It is letting people more specifically block out what they do not want to see on the service, including muting words, phrases and even entire conversations.

Twitter is also making it easier for people to report abusive behaviour, even if they are only bystanders to the abuse, and for the company to evaluate those reports.
And it has overhauled its approach to training support teams, holding special sessions on cultural and historical context for hateful conduct.

Critics said that while the steps are positive, they will not eliminate hate speech.
Twitter’s changes “don’t stop the problem of posting abusive content,” said Mark S Luckie, a former Twitter manager. Part of the reason abuse has thrived on Twitter is because the company allows anonymity, Luckie said.

“But unlike other sites with anonymity, Twitter lets users broadcast to the world — so their abuse has a huge potential impact,” he said. “If you fight with a celebrity and the celebrity fights back, then you have potentially reached a global audience with your abuse.”

Harvey acknowledged that Twitter has not always moved fast enough to clamp down on abusive behaviour.

She said that the problem would probably never be entirely solved, but that the company was doing more to identify repeat offenders who create new accounts when Twitter shuts them down or who incite users to gang up on others.