Tech

Twitter blocks 125, 000 accounts for terror content

Published

8 years ago

February 6, 2016

Social media platform Twitter has blocked over 125,000 accounts, most of them linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and Levante (ISIL) in a move which is coming after governments urged social networks to eliminate activity by terror groups which use such platforms to recruit new intakes and plot violent acts.

The move Twitter says is part of a stepped-up effort to eradicate “terrorist content” on the popular messaging platform with most of the accounts frozen since mid-2015 “for threatening or promoting terrorist acts”.

“Like most people around the world, we are horrified by the atrocities perpetrated by extremist groups,” Twitter said on its policy blog on Friday.

“We condemn the use of Twitter to promote terrorism and the Twitter rules make it clear that this type of behaviour, or any violent threat, is not permitted on our service.”

Twitter said it is driving up enforcement by boosting staff and using technology to filter violence-promoting content.

“As many experts and other companies have noted, there is no ‘magic algorithm’ for identifying terrorist content on the internet, so global online platforms are forced to make challenging judgement calls based on very limited information and guidance,” Twitter said.

“In spite of these challenges we will continue to aggressively enforce our rules in this area and engage with authorities and other relevant organisations to find viable solutions to eradicate terrorist content from the internet and promote powerful counter-speech narratives.”

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