trolling
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Anti-work subreddit temporarily goes private after awkward Fox News interview
The r/antiwork subreddit forum has temporarily gone private following a rough interview between Fox News and one of the subreddit's moderators.
A Japanese man was charged $81 for cyberbullying star Hana Kimura before her death
An online troll was charged $81 for cyberbullying Hana Kimura. Is that enough?
Twitch 'proactively' removed a police emote to prevent potential abuse
Twitch says it proactively removed the "TwitchCop" emote "to prevent misuse."
How Riot Games' new team plans to curb trolling before it begins
Riot Games doesn't use the word "toxic." "Toxicity means different things to different people," Riot's head of Player Dynamics Weszt Hart said. "What's trash talk to one person is totally inappropriate to someone else, which makes it really hard to proactively design a solution. 'Toxic' is so subjective, we failed to see how it was blinding us to the possibilities."
Twitter bans right-wing activist Jacob Wohl over fake accounts
Twitter has cracked down on one of its more overt offenders. The social network told Daily Beast it has banned conservative activist Jacob Wohl for "multiple violations" of its rules by creating and running numerous fake accounts. He'd admitted to USA Today in an interview that he intended to open fake Twitter and Facebook accounts to manipulate the 2020 election in favor of Trump, and it appears that he didn't waste time. A Daily Beast source said he'd already crafted "several" Twitter accounts before Twitter dropped the hammer.
Twitter says abuse reports have fallen by 16 percent
Twitter's attempts to improve the "health" of its conversation are paying dividends, according to the company's latest financial figures. The company is reporting a 16 percent fall in the number of abuse reports year on year, and a commensurate surge in profitability. In the last three months, Twitter pulled in revenues of $909 million, coining a tidy $255 million net profit.
After Las Vegas shooting, Facebook and Google get the news wrong again
The worst mass shooting in modern US history took place last night in Las Vegas, where a gunman killed at least 58 people and injured more than 515 others, according to the latest reports. Not long after the unfortunate event, Facebook and Google began populating news stories on their respective platforms, as they often do. And, in what's become a problematic trend, some of the articles being highlighted and distributed to millions of people were from unreliable sources. This time, among them were a trolling thread on internet forum board 4chan and a completely false story from a far-right conspiracy website.
Alphabet fights 'toxic' comments with machine learning
If you've spent any time at all on the internet, you know that finding civil conversation can be a real challenge. Whether on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter or your favorite news site, trolls can often dominate and derail the conversation. Today, Alphabet company Jigsaw has announced that it is using its machine learning chops to combat the problem. Perspective, which launches today, is an "early-stage" technology using machine learning to identify "toxic" comments. Furthermore, publishers will have access to an API to include this technology on their sites in the hopes that it'll lead to better conversations.
Twitter starts temporarily restricting abusive accounts
In a bid to stop trolling and online harassment, Twitter has now begun to reduce the reach of abusive accounts. The social media site's new vetting system temporarily restricts the tweets of abusive users, making them effectively invisible to those who don't already follow them. As well as stopping them being retweeted outside of their inner circle, this measure also works with mentions too. If the offending user tries to tweet at someone who isn't following them, for example, the intended receiver now won't get any notifications.
Science shows that anyone could become an online troll
It's easy to dismiss internet trolls as freaks. Surely they weren't raised well, right? Don't be so quick to judge. Cornell and Stanford researchers have published a study suggesting that anyone can engage in trolling if the circumstances are right. In an experiment, the schools skewed the moods of participants by making them complete either very easy or very difficult tests. They were then unleashed on the comment sections of online articles, some of which had trolling posts... and, well, you might have a hunch as to what came next.
Twitter will soon filter out abusive replies to tweets
Twitter is delivering three new tools to help battle abusive users just one week after admitting it hasn't moved fast enough to curb rampant harassment taking place on the platform. In a blog post published this morning, VP of engineering Ed Ho announced three new features that'll be on Twitter soon. Perhaps the most immediately useful is a filter that hides "abusive or low-quality" tweets by default. It sounds similar to the "quality filter" that tries to remove trolls from your @ mentions.
Celebs ask Twitter to tackle a specific harassment case
Twitter has frequently been accused of waiting until harassment campaigns are big enough to make the news before it responds to them -- just ask Leslie Jones. And unfortunately, it looks like history might just repeat itself. Comedians Patton Oswalt, Tim Heidecker and others are calling on Twitter to take action following allegations that "alt-right" figure Mike Cernovich is conducting a sustained harassment campaign against Tim & Eric collaborator Vic Berger IV in retaliation for jokes and videos making fun of Cernovich.
Instagram finally lets users disable comments on posts
In recent months, Instagram has finally stated rolling out tools that let users combat abuse. First, Instagram added the ability to block specific words from your comments, and today it is adding a host of other tools to keep trolls out of your account. The company says all the new features will be available in the coming weeks. First up is a tool that'll let you remove comments entirely from your posts. When creating a new Instagram post, you'll find an "advanced settings" menu where you can turn off comments for that image. You can also reverse course and turn commenting back on if you so choose. Unfortunately, it doesn't sound like you can shut off comments globally in your account; hopefully Instagram will add that option next.
Twitter bans multiple 'alt-right' accounts
In the wake of releasing more tools to combat abuse on its service, Twitter has banned the accounts of a number of "alt-right" users. That includes the head of the National Policy Institute (NPI), Richard Spencer. The think tank describes itself as "dedicated to the heritage, identity and future of people of European descent in the United States and around the world." USA Today reports that the purge started with Spencer's verified status being revoked before removing his account (@RichardBSPencer), the NPI's (@npiamerica) and his publication The Radix Journal's (@radixjournal).
UK targets doxxing, hashtags and more in online troll crackdown
Over the course of the year, the UK government has attempted to crack down internet abuse by introducing new guidelines for prosecutors and forming a new troll-hunting police unit. Those updates ensured that anyone creating websites or fake online profiles with the intention to humiliate someone could be punished, but the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has today added a new list of offences aimed at bringing trolls to justice.
Why is the Oculus founder trying to bring hateful memes offline?
Online abuse and bullying have existed as long as the internet has, but it's gone mainstream in a big way over the past few years. Perhaps not coincidentally, we've also spent the past year-plus subjected to Donald Trump's presidential campaign, an outing built on lies, harassment, intimidation and a whole host of other behavior not befitting a candidate for the country's highest office. These two trends collided late last week when it was revealed that Oculus VR founder and Facebook employee Palmer Luckey donated $10,000 to a pro-Trump group called Nimble America. The group's stated purpose is to prove that "shitposting is powerful and meme magic is real." Thus far, there's no evidence that Nimble America has been able to do anything aside from put up one insulting but fairly mild anti-Hillary Clinton billboard outside of Pittsburgh. Despite the group's lack of impact thus far, the fact that Luckey found Nimble America worth supporting shows just how widespread trolling has become.
An insurance provider is offering cyberbullying coverage
A high-end insurance provider in the UK has become what's thought to be the first to include personal cover for victims of cyberbullying. Chubb Insurance -- unrelated to the lock and security system companies of similar name, if you were wondering -- began offering the so-called "troll insurance" to new customers last month, and will extend the option to policy renewers in the new year. While some other providers will cover the cost of launching or defending a cyberbullying lawsuit, Chubb's policy focuses on the wellbeing of the adult or child on the receiving end of online abuse.
Facebook changes 'Real Name' policy rules after public outcry
Facebook announced Friday that it is modifying the terms of its oft-criticised "real name" policy which demands users go by their "authentic name" when on the social network rather than a pseudonym. The trans and Native American communities have repeatedly protested the policy, citing its use by trolls as a weapon of harassment. Today's announcement comes in response to an open letter penned by advocacy groups including the EFF and ACLU.
New Zealand makes cyberbullying a crime
New Zealand has passed a law that criminalizes one of the least desirable facets of the internet: cyberbullying. The legislation effectively prohibits sending messages to people that are racist, sexist, critical of their religion, sexuality or disability. The rest for determining harm will be if these communications were designed to cause "serious emotional distress," and if a person is found guilty, could face up to two years in jail. In addition, the bill creates a separate crime of incitement to suicide, which will see a person jailed for up to three years if they are found to be encouraging such an act.
'#Notifications' is a weak attempt at simulating online abuse
Spend enough time on social media and you're bound to make a mistake that'll piss a few people off. It's pretty much inevitable. That's what the free indie "game" #notifications is all about. It begins the way many of us start our day: lying in bed, checking Twitter ("Twiddler" in this case) on a smartphone. There's a single eponymous notification for you at this point: a favorite on a tweet from the night before reading, "Tomorrow's going to be good, I can feel it!" That was incredibly short-lived.
