Election 2020: Twitter Places New Restrictions On Users To Combat Misinformation

Twitter on Friday announced it would add new restrictions on tweets when U.S. politicians and other users try to spread election misinformation, joining other social media companies in tightening its rules in the final weeks of voting.

Twitter has been consistently criticized over spreading falsified or misleading posts, including tweets from President Donald about mail-in voting. Twitter now aims to counter misinformation directed at voters.

In a blog post, Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s policy chief, and Kayvon Beykpour, the company’s product chief, said warnings will be placed on misleading tweets so that users have to physically click off the warning to view the post.

“Retweets and replies will be turned off, and these Tweets won’t be algorithmically recommended by Twitter,” the executives wrote, although people will be able to add commentary to a misleading tweet with the service’s quote-tweet feature.

“We expect this will further reduce the visibility of misleading information and will encourage people to reconsider if they want to amplify these Tweets,” they wrote.

Trump has frequently used Twitter and Facebook to claim without evidence that mail-in ballots cannot be accurately counted or are more susceptible to fraud than other forms of voting.

Facebook is also tightening its rules while citizens continue to vote. It banned QAnon accounts in a sweeping crackdown on the conspiracy theory.

Google also added that it will restrict political ads after polls close Nov. 3 while votes get counted. Facebook later adopted the same policy.

Gadde and Beykpour said Twitter users had a “collective responsibility to the electorate to guarantee a safe, fair, and legitimate democratic process.”