The layoffs included many people who were scheduled to make calls this weekend and early next week to monitor for signs of foreign disinformation, spam and other problematic content about the election, he said. A former employee told The Washington Post.As of Friday morning, employee access to internal tools used to moderate content continues to be restricted, and staff members responding to misinformation are being harassed. Limited ability.
Twitter has become one of America’s most influential platforms for disseminating accurate voting information. The day before an election was often a key time for companies and campaign officials to engage in near-constant dialogue about potential risks.
However, a representative of the National Party Committee confirmed that responses from Twitter contacts had been delayed by several hours, and said it had raised concerns about workplace disruptions and abrupt dismissals at toll booths. . The representative spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
Some researchers tracking online threats have said that communication lines between companies and police that have been used to identify voter intimidation and those threatening offline violence have been cut. I am afraid that
“Law enforcement agencies are often used to identifying individuals they believe pose a real threat,” said Catherine Kennelly, senior research manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a think tank that studies political extremism and polarization. , can lose valuable time.”
Kennelly said there has already been an increase in threatening election-related content. She pointed to one user-written post about the need to “pour bleach or gasoline” at ballot boxes, the target of right-wing conspiracy theories about systemic voter fraud.
A Twitter spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment. Many of them were on furloughs.
Yoel Roth, the company’s head of safety and integrity and one of the few top executives to survive the Musk acquisition, tweeted on Friday night that the company’s “core moderation capabilities remain intact.” He said Twitter’s Trust & Safety division cuts were about 15%, while company-wide cuts were closer to 50% for him.
“With early voting underway in the United States, our work on electoral integrity, including combating harmful misinformation and state-sponsored information manipulation that can suppress voters, remains a top priority. matter,” he tweeted.
Musk, the world’s richest man who spent $44 billion on the site, said the company’s massive cuts to 7,500 staff would help prepare for future success, and offered services to secure its platform. I instructed my employees to roll it out. Digital Town Square.
But some of his more aggressive changes have sparked unease. It’s a service that gives paying users a “verified” checkmark icon that’s only offered to homeowners, journalists, and other celebrities. confirmed their identities. The move could cause deep turmoil in the final hours of the race, according to some political sources.
“Election spoofing [officials] This is a serious concern for us as platforms are considering changing their verification,” said Amy Cohen, executive director of the National Association of Election Administrators. “We hope Twitter leadership recognizes the important role the platform plays in the election information ecosystem and rolls out changes carefully ahead of the election.”
Among the layoffs to Twitter was also the curation team. It’s a key part of the company’s efforts to direct users to trusted news sources and quell viral hoaxes and conspiracy theories. For years, the team has battled election-related falsehoods, such as claims that mail-in ballots will be annulled, and has provided reliable information when a losing candidate falsely claims victory.
In October 2020, ahead of the US presidential election, the team added context to all the trends seen in major real estate on Twitter (the “For you” and “What’s going” boxes) and added them to the app and website. Did. As recently as two weeks before him, Twitter touted the team’s ranting efforts as a key aspect of it. Towards the 2022 Midterm Elections.
But on Friday, multiple Twitter employees told The Washington Post that Musk’s layoff appeared to have laid off the entire team. Edward Perez, a former Twitter product director and election integrity expert, said, “Just days before a major election, Twitter’s aggressive campaign to pre-expose or attempt to expose false claims. It’s just the worst possible time for Musk to withdraw from the effort.”
The layoffs also upset members of civil rights and advocacy groups who met with Musk earlier this week to share concerns about his takeover. Free Press co-leader Jessica Gonzalez said on Friday that Musk “committed to maintaining and implementing the election integrity measures that were in Twitter’s book prior to his acquisition.” “With today’s mass layoffs, it is clear that Musk’s actions betrayed his word. …Even before Musk took over, the operation was dangerously underresourced.”
Rashad Robinson, president of the civil rights group Color of Change, took issue with Musk’s proposal to change Twitter’s “verified” system just before the midterm elections, saying: [an] It will have an unprecedented impact on electoral chaos. ”
“Right-wing trolls can pay $8 on Mondays, put a blue check mark, then change their username to ‘CNN’ or ‘Secretary of State of Georgia’, show up as verified, and call race ‘ he said.
Even before the cuts, experts warned that Twitter didn’t have enough people to handle content moderation. An audit commissioned by company whistleblower Peiter Zatko from his Alethea Group found that Twitter’s integrity team was “constantly understaffed” and “forced to make significant tradeoffs.” turned out to be
During the US election, Twitter assembled an election team that included people outside of its core content moderation unit to help identify threats. The company’s ability to staff that division will likely be impacted by the job cuts.
A researcher studying election misinformation said there was also uncertainty about what the cutbacks on Twitter would mean as voters across the country headed to polling stations.
Kate Starbird, an associate professor at the University of Washington, said at a virtual conference on Friday that Twitter was in “massive turmoil” and that “the dynamics are changing without even knowing what happened under the hood. I’m waiting for it to change,” he said.
“Some of the way the platform worked yesterday will be different than the way the election goes today, tomorrow, Tuesday,” she said.
Joan Donovan, director of research at the Shorenstein Center for Media, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University, also sees reports of an increase in organized activism, hateful content and harassing messages. said. However, she predicted she was encouraged by Musk’s decision not to allow banned users to return to the platform immediately.
Meanwhile, other platforms were jubilant about the potential for less content moderation on Twitter. A user with more than 72,000 followers on chat app Telegram said the expected change would come “just before the US election” and that “whatever happens on Tuesday…more people will be talking about it on Twitter.” Let’s go,” he celebrated.
For Donovan, that expectation can actually blunt the impact of misinformation. “With the chaotic changes on Twitter unfolding in public, many people are already skeptical of the information coming from the platform,” she said. “It is not considered a reliable source at this time.”
Some employees in positions related to the midterm elections announced their layoffs on Twitter. Michele Austin, the company’s director of public policy for the United States and Canada, wrote that she helped lead the 2022 midterm elections on the platform and “denies her time at the company is over.” is doing”.
Kevin Sullivan, a civic integrity expert who said he led the 2022 midterm election editorial planning and election misinformation on LinkedIn, also announced his resignation.
“Couldn’t you wait until Wednesday? #Election2022” he tweeted.
Matt Brown, Naomi Nix, Will Oremus, Brittany Shammas, and Yvonne Wingett Sanchez contributed to this report.
