According to a story in The Wall Street Journal and an email, Twitter disbanded its Trust and Safety Council on Monday night. The council was established in 2016 and was in charge of dealing with issues including hate speech, child exploitation, suicide, self-harm, and others on the site. This was before Elon Musk took control of the site.
“As Twitter moves into a new phase, we are reevaluating how best to bring external insights into our product and policy development work. As part of this process, we have decided that the Trust and Safety Council is not the best structure to do this,” read the email signed “Twitter.”
“Our work to make Twitter a safe, informative place will be moving faster and more aggressively than ever before and we will continue to welcome your ideas going forward about how to achieve this goal,” the email said.
Twitter hasn’t officially said anything on the matter
Twitter hasn’t made any public comments about the situation. The choice was made on the same day Musk posted that Twitter’s Basic blue tick will feature half as many adverts and would provide a higher tier without any by the end of the next year. The action aims to increase revenue for the social media network.
Earlier in the day, the company turned on the Twitter Blue sign again. According to reports, individuals would receive a blue check, whereas businesses and government entities will receive gold and grey check marks. For the web and Apple devices, the monthly subscription fee will be $8 and $11, respectively.
Ella Irwin, Twitter’s new head of trust and safety, told WSJ that the business is moving rapidly to resolve problematic content. Irwin was given the responsibility for supervising user content and safety regulations in November. But the council was supposed to meet Irwin and Nick Pickles, senior director for global public policy strategy, development, and partnerships, one hour before the cancellation email arrived.
Since Musk took over, there have been doubts about the Trust and Safety Council
Since Musk took over, the Trust and Safety Council’s function has been in doubt. He had previously stated that he would establish a content control committee, but it was unclear how it would interact with the Trust and Safety Council.
The Trust and Safety Council’s regularly planned meeting had been postponed by Twitter until December 15 of last month, but it was ultimately moved up to Monday of last week.
Notably, the Trust and Safety Council had expressed dissatisfaction with the platform’s handling of content. On November 29, the members had a meeting without any representatives from Twitter to discuss their worries. Last week, three members of the council officially stated their intention to resign, claiming that the safety and welfare of users were not given any consideration.