Twitter revealed during its Analyst Day Presentation that it is planning to introduce a new feature that will allow users to be able to automatically block and mute accounts that are abusive. This is an attempt at ensuring that Twitter is safe for all users and is free from any form of bullying and abuse from other users.
Twitter made it known that this new feature will be available in a new ‘safety mode’ that will appear as a toggle so that users can easily navigate their way through. According to Twitter when you switch the toggle on, it will ‘automatically block accounts that appear to break the Twitter rules, and mute accounts that might be using insults, name-calling, strong language, or hateful remarks’.
Twitter has always been proactive when it comes to securing the interests of its users and ensuring that it is a safe place for all. For instance during the Capitol incident, it didn’t delay in suspending the account of the then President. With Twitter’s new safety mode, Twitter will be able to automatically detect accounts that ‘might be acting abusive or spammy’ and can limit these accounts from interacting with other users for period of seven days.
The history of Twitter (and social media as a whole) has been filled with stories of cyber-bullying, abuse, fraudulence, and what have you. Twitter has been working assiduously to ensure that its users are safe and have the best experience on the platform and that is why over the years it has released quite a number of impressive features to tackle offensive content as well as reduce the perpetrators of this act. Some of the features the company has released over the years are; The ‘hide replies’ feature which as the name suggests allows users to hide replies that they do not want other users to see, Control over who can reply an individual tweets, and tools that are in place to remove abusive tweets before they are even reported. These tools have the ability to recognize offensive and abusive tweets before they are even reported and is quite efficient.
Twitter is one of the biggest social media platforms in the world over 330 million users as at January 2021 according to Statista, the importance of keeping it safe for all users can therefore not be over-emphasized.
