Twitter will now apply labels to Tweets that may contain misleading information about COVID-19 vaccines, in its efforts to remove harmful and misleading information from the platform.
Labels will appear in the account’s display language and may link to either the curated content tab and the official public health information or the Twitter Rules page. Twitter’s team will initially apply labels to content that violates Twitter’s policies. Those assessments will be used to further inform Twitter’s automated tools to identify and label similar content across the service, explains the agency.
In addition to labels, Twitter claims to introduce a strike system that will determine when further enforcement is necessary. The strike system will help educate the public on Twitter’s policies and further reduce the spread of potentially harmful and misleading information on the platform, particularly for repeated, moderate and high severity rule violations.
Twitter assures to protect the public conversation, with a goal to make it easy to find verified information. In December 2020, Twitter shared updates on its work to protect the public conversation surrounding COVID-19. Since introducing its COVID-19 guidance, the platform has permanently suspended 2,400 accounts and challenged 11.5 million accounts worldwide.
Additionally, Twitter continues to partner with organizations like Team Halo, UNICEF, NHS and the Vaccine Confidence Project. To support the vaccination drive, Twitter has activated an emoji when #Vaccinated is Tweeted, building upon its earlier efforts to encourage people to #StayHome, #WashHands and #WearAMask. Twitter also continues to host a weekly live Q&A on an event page for the World Health Organization at #AskWHO.
As health authorities deepen their understanding of COVID-19 and vaccination programs around the world are rolled out, Twitter says to amplify the most current, up-to-date and authoritative information on the platform by partnering with experts and consulting with local, national and global public health authorities worldwide.
