Twitter Secretly Censored Offensive Tweets During Obama Q&A: Report

Twitter workers have silently filtered tweets with insulting language for a Q&A session with President Obama, and possibly in another meeting with luminary Caitlyn Jenner, sources have informed BuzzFeed.

Twitter Secretly Censored Offensive Tweets During Obama Q&A: Report

An ex-senior Twitter employee also said that during a May 2015 #AskPOTUS event, then-CEO Dick Costolo told employees to use a system to filter out offensive tweets. Another source reveals that a team also manually detached messages that slithered through.

Also Read: Twitter Updates its Policy to Prevent Abusive Behavior and Hateful Conduct

The verdict was apparently made without telling higher-level adherents of Twitter, in order to evade oppositions.

In 2014, a computerized system seemed to be hindering anti-Semitic affronts tweeted at British Parliament member Luciana Berger.

Though Twitter didn’t approve the report at that time. It was possibly a worrying expansion. Specially for a platform that has both articulated a dedication to unbound speech and failed at cutting harassment.

As another BuzzFeed source records, the move could be an instance of a “dual standard” approving high-profile users whose exit could really upset Twitter’s public image.

This summer Twitter also debarred the account of longtime tyrant Milo Yiannopoulos. Devoid of further clarification or transparency, eliminating certain classes of tweets for specific users weakens Twitter’s effort to deliver an extensive platform for speech. While doing little to benefit the people who are at risk.

Costolo also called the report,

“Total nonsense and laughably false as anybody who would speak on the record would tell you. Absurd. Not even going to link to it. Shows a lack of understanding of the very basics of how trust and safety works at Twitter. Sensationalist nonsense.”