Twitter blocking links promoting hate speech, violence

Twitter on Tuesday announced that it would begin to ban posts with links that redirect users to hate speech and other offensive comments as the social media platform attempts to crack down further on the proliferation of problematic content on its site.

“We’ve updated our link policy,” Twitter tweeted from its official support account. “Hateful conduct and violence are now link content categories that we may block [and] Accounts dedicated to sharing these types of links may be suspended.”

As we continue to address harmful content, we’ve updated our link policy:

1️⃣ Hateful conduct and violence are now link content categories that we may block
2️⃣ Accounts dedicated to sharing these types of links may be suspended

The full policy: https://t.co/G99F3M779b

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) July 28, 2020

Twitter in recent months has become more emboldened in censoring misinformation and other content that violates the site’s terms of use as inaccurate statements about the coronavirus pandemic began to become commonplace. 

The platform has even flagged multiple tweets from President Trump, a practice that it had never done before. Angered by the censorship, the president and his administration have moved to remove protections that internet companies have by law, namely Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act.

Under Section 230, internet companies such as Twitter have immunity from lawsuits relating to content posted on their sites by third parties and gives them the oversight to make “good faith” efforts to moderate content.

Trump at the end of May signed an executive order that would reduce and restructure these protections. On Monday, the administration moved forward with its plan, filing a petition with the Federal Communications Commission. The petition seeks for the FCC to “clarify that Section 230 does not permit social media companies that alter or editorialize users’ speech to escape civil liability,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a release.