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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Twitter has been engaged in a game of whack-a-mole with accounts linked to "terrorism" [npr.org] since 2015, and has announced that it has suspended more than 125,000 accounts as part of its efforts to "combat" extremism:

In its ongoing effort to combat violent extremism, Twitter announced Friday that it has suspended more than 125,000 accounts since mid-2015 because of what it called their connections to terrorist or extremist groups, primarily ISIS.

NPR's Aarti Shahani reports that the company says there is no "magic algorithm" to identify terrorist content on the Internet, so they're forced to make make challenging judgment calls based on "very limited information and guidance." "The company says it's trying to strike the right balance between enforcement against tweets that break the rules, the needs of law enforcement, and free expression," Aarti reports.

In a statement [twitter.com], Twitter also said it has "increased the size of the teams that review reports," enabling it to respond more quickly to terrorism-related posts. "We have already seen results, including an increase in account suspensions and this type of activity shifting off of Twitter," the company said.

The statement comes just weeks after a woman sued Twitter [reuters.com], accusing the platform of giving voice to ISIS. Tamara Fields, a Florida woman whose husband Lloyd died in a November attack on a police training center in Amman, Jordan, said Twitter "knowingly let the militant Islamist group use its network to spread propaganda, raise money and attract recruits," according to the complaint [reuters.com]. The suit also alleged that "ISIS members use Twitter to post instructional guidelines and promotional videos, referred to as 'mujatweets.'"

Related: Google Chairman Eric Schmidt Asks for "Spell-Checker" for Hate and Harassment [soylentnews.org]

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