Misinformation spreads more rapidly than genuine information, especially through Social Media and over the past few years, several democracies have been disturbed due to this. However, Twitter has taken upon itself to cleanse itself from misleading tweets by introducing a new tool. The tool in discussion will allow users to report tweets that, according to them, mislead voters.
Due to the ongoing General Elections in India, the new feature will be available there first, on Thursday. Following that, it will be rolled out to the European Union, where elections will be held on April 29.
Twitter is well-aware of the lasting effects of election interference and believes that goes against the company’s core values. The misleading tweets include manipulating or interfering tweets such as those which provide misleading details regarding the voting or registration process or those which try to scam users by offering them fake e-mails or numbers through which the votes should be casted. Also, misinformation in regards to election date and time as well as about voting requirements shall also be dealt with accordingly.
The process to flag misleading tweets is quite straight-forward i.e. Click/tap on the drop down menu on the tweet and choose “Report Tweet” and from there, select the “It’s misleading about voting” option.
Even though Twitter doesn’t have a full-fledged policy for handling misinformation yet, it has to report to the European Union, along with Google and Facebook, about its actions every month, leading into the upcoming European Parliament elections.
Not too impressed with the progress of Twitter, Facebook and Google, the European Commission reported on Tuesday that all the mentioned platforms still have a lot of work to do, when it comes to handling misinformation. The 3 companies were also suggested to work more on critical areas such as ad transparency.
Read next: Twitter's First Quarter Results for this year Managed to Exceed all Expectations, even with monthly active users Stumbling!
Featured photo: Gabby Jones/ Bloomberg / Getty Images
Due to the ongoing General Elections in India, the new feature will be available there first, on Thursday. Following that, it will be rolled out to the European Union, where elections will be held on April 29.
Twitter is well-aware of the lasting effects of election interference and believes that goes against the company’s core values. The misleading tweets include manipulating or interfering tweets such as those which provide misleading details regarding the voting or registration process or those which try to scam users by offering them fake e-mails or numbers through which the votes should be casted. Also, misinformation in regards to election date and time as well as about voting requirements shall also be dealt with accordingly.
Public conversation on Twitter is never more important than during elections. Today, we’re launching a new reporting feature to tackle deliberate attempts to mislead about voting. We’ll start with #LokSabhaElections2019 & #EUelections2019 https://t.co/rDdEwX3FcR pic.twitter.com/jrLOc3k1hC— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) April 24, 2019
The process to flag misleading tweets is quite straight-forward i.e. Click/tap on the drop down menu on the tweet and choose “Report Tweet” and from there, select the “It’s misleading about voting” option.
Even though Twitter doesn’t have a full-fledged policy for handling misinformation yet, it has to report to the European Union, along with Google and Facebook, about its actions every month, leading into the upcoming European Parliament elections.
Not too impressed with the progress of Twitter, Facebook and Google, the European Commission reported on Tuesday that all the mentioned platforms still have a lot of work to do, when it comes to handling misinformation. The 3 companies were also suggested to work more on critical areas such as ad transparency.
Read next: Twitter's First Quarter Results for this year Managed to Exceed all Expectations, even with monthly active users Stumbling!
Featured photo: Gabby Jones/ Bloomberg / Getty Images
