Twitter has updated its reporting process, now allowing users to specifically identify accounts they believe to be fake.
Under the new process, when a user reports a tweet as “suspicious or spam,” a menu appears asking why. Users can select from a number of explanations, including “the account tweeting this is fake”; “includes a link to a potentially harmful, malicious, or phishing site”; “the hashtags included seem unrelated”; or “uses the reply function to spam.”
Twitter announced the update through its official safety account Wednesday.
https://twitter.com/TwitterSafety/status/1057675174735155200?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1057675174735155200&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theverge.com%2F2018%2F10%2F31%2F18048838%2Ftwitter-report-fake-accounts-spam-bot-crackdown
“The new reporting flow allows us to gather more specific information around the type of spam we’re seeing,” a Twitter spokesperson told Fortune, adding that the additional information should allow Twitter to “tackle spam more efficiently.”
Twitter has been cracking down on fake or malicious accounts since the 2016 presidential election, when a Russian-backed misinformation campaign used social media ads and accounts to sway public opinion. This year in May and June alone, Twitter suspended 70 million suspicious accounts. The cleanup led to a drop of 1 million users in the second quarter as follower counts plummeted.
Still, a study published by the Knight Foundation earlier this month found that more than 80% of the accounts linked to the 2016 election meddling are still active, publishing more than a million tweets per day.
