The day after the Biden administration dismantled the “Ministry of Truth,” Twitter announces a version of its own.
“Tweets with content that violate the crisis misinformation policy will be placed behind a warning notice,” the new policy reads, adding that a tweet in violation will not be able to be liked, retweeted, or shared.
Newsmax host Benny Johnson called it the “New Narrative Control Policy.”
New Narrative Control Policy just dropped https://t.co/fU6o4BQbU8
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) May 19, 2022
Twitter’s head of Safety & Integrity, Yoel Roth, made the announcement in a lengthy blog post.
“Today, we’re introducing our crisis misinformation policy – a global policy that will guide our efforts to elevate credible, authoritative information, and will help to ensure viral misinformation isn’t amplified or recommended by us during crises,” Roth said. “In times of crisis, misleading information can undermine public trust and cause further harm to already vulnerable communities. Alongside our existing work to make reliable information more accessible during crisis events, this new approach will help to slow the spread by us of the most visible, misleading content, particularly that which could lead to severe harms.”
The policy has been in the works for the last year and has been informed by the United Nations with input from “global experts and human rights organizations.”
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The Big Tech company says it will censor and shadowban posts it deems “misinformation.”
We’ve been refining our approach to crisis misinformation, drawing on input from global experts and human rights organizations. As part of this new framework, we’ll start adding warning notices on high visibility misleading Tweets related to the war in Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/fr0NGleJXP
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) May 19, 2022
“To reduce potential harm, as soon as we have evidence that a claim may be misleading, we won’t amplify or recommend content that is covered by this policy across Twitter – including in the Home timeline, Search, and Explore,” it reads. “In addition, we will prioritize adding warning notices to highly visible Tweets and Tweets from high profile accounts, such as state-affiliated media accounts, verified, official government accounts.”
Some examples of Tweets that we may add a warning notice to include:
False coverage or event reporting, or information that mischaracterizes conditions on the ground as a conflict evolves;
False allegations regarding use of force, incursions on territorial sovereignty, or around the use of weapons;
Demonstrably false or misleading allegations of war crimes or mass atrocities against specific populations;
False information regarding international community response, sanctions, defensive actions, or humanitarian operations.
Strong commentary, efforts to debunk or fact check, and personal anecdotes or first person accounts do not fall within the scope of the policy.
Roth said the policy started with the war in Ukraine.
“Content moderation is more than just leaving up or taking down content, and we’ve expanded the range of actions we may take to ensure they’re proportionate to the severity of the potential harm,” he said. “We’ve found that not amplifying or recommending certain content, adding context through labels, and in severe cases, disabling engagement with the Tweets, are effective ways to mitigate harm, while still preserving speech and records of critical global events. “