It says, for example, it will add more notices within Twitter for clarity around tweets that breaks its rules but are allowed to remain on the site. This is, in part, a response to some users’ complaints around President Trump’s apparently rule-breaking tweets that aren’t taken down. Twitter’s head of legal, policy and trust Vijaya Gadde recently mentioned this change was in the works, in a March interview with The Washington Post.
More vaguely, Twitter states it’s improving its technology to help it proactively review content that breaks rules before it’s reported — specifically in the areas of those who dox users (tweet private information), make threats and other online abuse. The company didn’t go in-depth as to how it’s approaching these problems, but it did acquire an anti-abuse technology provider Smyte last year, with the goal of better addressing the abuse on its platform.
Today, 38 percent of abusive content that’s enforced is handled proactively (note: much content still has no enforcement action taken, though); 16 percent fewer abuse reports after an interaction from an account the reporter doesn’t follow; 100K accounts suspended for returning to create new accounts during Jan. – March 2019, a 45 percent increase from the same time last year; a 60 percent faster response rates to appeals requests through its in-app appeal process, 3x more abusive accounts suspended within 24 hours, compared to the same time last year; and 2.5x more private info removed with its new reporting process compared with the old process.
But these are largely “vanity metrics” as they don’t offer real, hard numbers about the extent of abuse on Twitter. 100K accounts may have been caught, but how many were not? 3x more abuse accounts suspended — but how many were there? How fast is private info actually taken down? How many people appealed their reports? How many feel the report resolved their problem? How many abuse reports in total, are there? Is that number growing or declining? What percent of the user base has used the reporting process because of harassment towards themselves? And so on.
Despite Twitter’s attempts to solve issues around online abuse, it still drops the ball in handling what should be straightforward decisions. It’s not necessarily alone here, however. All of social media is at a crossroads, having built platforms that cater to engagement over health and safety; they’re now trying to backpedal furiously ahead of increased regulation.