USA TODAY International Edition
Amid backlash, Twitter vows to crack down on hate speech
With public backlash growing, Twitter says it’s taking steps to crack down on hate speech, from making it easier to report alleged incidents on the social media service to educating moderators on what kind of conduct violates the rules.
Twitter users will also gain more control over their experience with the ability to mute words and phrases, even entire conversations, if they don’t want to receive notifications about them, said Del Harvey, Twitter’s head of safety.
The effort comes as an uptick in biased graffiti, assaults and other incidents have been reported in the news and on social media since Election Day, prompting president- elect Donald Trump to call for people to “stop it” during a 60 Minutes interview on Sunday. The FBI reports hate crimes rose 7% in 2015, led by attacks on Muslim Americans.
It’s also in response to escalating concern about abuse and harassment on Twitter that has stalled growth among users and advertisers alike.
Under chief executive Jack Dorsey, Twitter has pledged that “trust and safety” is among its top priorities. Earlier this year, the company improved its abuse reporting system and convened outside advisers on safety issues.
Yet little has changed. Watchdog groups say Twitter for years has failed to provide effective tools for its 317 million users to combat abuse, causing hate speech to spread on the platform.
“Hate speech is out of control on Twitter,” said Heidi Beirich, spokeswoman for the Southern Poverty Law Center.
According to Brandwatch and anti- bullying group Ditch the Label, racist language is the most common form of hate speech on Twitter.
Of the 19 million tweets analyzed by specific search terms, more than 7.7 million contained racially insensitive language, the research found.
In one of the highest- profile incidents, Twitter banned Milo Yiannopoulos, a technology editor at the conservative news site
Breitbart, in July for engaging in a campaign of abuse in which hundreds of anonymous Twitter accounts bombarded Ghostbuster actress Leslie Jones with racist and sexist taunts.
A report in October from The Anti- Defamation League documented the rise in anti- Semitic tweets targeting journalists who covered Trump, the Republican presidential nominee. Words that appear frequently in the profiles of these Twitter accounts: Trump, nationalist, conservative, white.
After the election, neo- Nazi website The Daily Stormer published a list of more than 50 Twitter users who had expressed fear about the outcome of the 2016 election, urging its readers to “punish” them with a barrage of tweets that would drive them to suicide.
Jennifer Soto Segundo, a Clinton supporter in Orlando, says she expressed her dismay at Hillary Clinton’s loss on Twitter, only to be greeted the next day by violent tweets — one from a user urging her to step into a gas chamber and another calling for her deportation.
“We are nothing but frustrated with Twitter,” Beirich said. “I am glad they’re putting out new policies but, given their past history, there’s not a lot to make me hopeful about Twitter unfortunately.”
Harvey, who has run safety at Twitter for eight years, says she has had a “front- row seat” for the evolution of abuse and harassment on the social media service.
With the latest updates to its policies and features, Twitter is attempting to preserve free speech while drawing a hard line at “behavior that is intended to silence others,” Harvey said.
“While we have taken steps over the years to try to combat abuse and harassment, we haven’t moved as quickly as we would have liked or we haven’t always done as much as we would have liked because we have tried to make sure we are not making decisions that have unintended, negative consequences and ramifications,” she said.
First, Twitter users will now be able to report “hateful conduct” as a separate option. “Our hope is by having it as an explicit reporting option, it will make it easier for people to flag it to us and for us to take action on it as we can,” Harvey said.
Separately, reporting hateful conduct will also help Twitter better process reports from bystanders, alleviating the burden on the person being subjected to the abuse, Harvey said.
Second, Twitter has retrained support teams, offering sessions that teach the cultural and historical context to help moderators recognize hate speech, and has put in place an ongoing program to refresh employees on abuse and update them on new forms of it, Harvey said.
In addition, Twitter is making changes to notifications, allowing users to mute words, phrases, emojis, even entire conversations, because, Harvey says, abuse “is acutely felt in notifications.”
Eventually, Twitter will expand the mute function to everywhere users see tweets. Twitter already allows users to mute accounts they don’t want to see tweets from.
Given their past history, there’s not a lot to make me hopeful about Twitter unfortunately.” Heidi Beirich, spokeswoman for the Southern Poverty Law Center