Twitter says removed more content in first half of 2022 than in previous six months

Twitter on Tuesday mentioned it required customers to take down over 6.5 million items of content material within the first half of 2022, earlier than the social media platform was taken over by billionaire Elon Musk, a 29% enhance from the second half of 2021.

Twitter disclosed the variety of content material removals in a weblog publish on the identical day the European Union mentioned the social media platform can be amongst 19 tech firms topic to new landmark guidelines that require them to share knowledge with authorities, do extra to deal with disinformation and conduct exterior and impartial auditing.

Failure to adjust to the principles – among the world’s strictest laws on on-line platforms – may end in fines of as much as 6% of world income or perhaps a ban from working within the EU, in line with the European Commission’s web site.

Before Musk bought Twitter in October and lower roughly 80% of its workers, Twitter usually revealed twice-yearly reviews on its Transparency Center web site, detailing data such because the variety of accounts it suspended and the variety of authorities requests it acquired for knowledge.

Twitter’s replace on Tuesday got here within the type of a brief weblog publish, and the corporate mentioned it could give an replace about its “path forward for transparency reporting” later this 12 months.

Publishing transparency reviews is likely one of the necessities underneath the EU’s new web guidelines.

The firm mentioned it acquired 53,000 authorized requests from governments throughout the first half of 2022 to take away sure content material, with Japan, South Korea, Turkey and India submitting probably the most requests. Twitter didn’t disclose the variety of requests it complied with.

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