It’s not often you can get a response from the folks at Twitter. Of course, you are welcome to ask, complain, or raise concerns. The online social network grew so quickly and so powerfully over the past six years, its likely many concerns from users got lost in the Twittersphere . . . forever. Freedom of speech often trumps any rumblings of cyber bullying, hate speech, and other threatening behavior that transpires on the wildly popular 140-character social network.
But when users complained recently (and started an online petition) about a slew of hateful tweets against a high-profile journalist, Twitter responded loudly and clearly.
We’d like to take this opportunity to offer up a collective “Thank You” from the parenting camp.
Twitter announced it will launch an in-tweet report abuse button across all platforms. According to Twitter’s UK blog, the button is only available on the iOS app and mobile web currently, but will be launched for the Android app and the non-mobile version of Twitter.com in September. Twitter says it will also add staff to review flagged tweets and to work to make sure all users feel safe.
In other safety news, Twitter also announced that it will be updating the way it handles security for its social network, by introducing a new-and improved two-factor authentication. After a rash of hacks on high-profile Twitter accounts (one in which pranksters used the Associated Press account to spread a fake report of an explosion at the White House), the pressure was on to up security.
This mom believes parents everywhere just took two steps forward on the security front when it comes to social networks being more accountable to the safety of its users. This is definitely a win for families.
If you need a quick refresher on Twitter, we recently wrote a blog post especially for parents that will help
Toni Birdsong is a Family Safety Evangelist to McAfee. You can find her on Twitter @SafeEyes. (Disclosures)