Twitter slapped with legal action over soaring number of hate tweets on platform

Australia says Twitter and its billionaire owner Elon Musk have “dropped the ball” over an issue that continues to dog the social media giant.

Australia has slapped Twitter with a potential $700,000-a-day fine. Picture: Instagram

Twitter has been slapped with a legal notice from Australia over claims it is not doing enough to tackle hate on the platform.

It comes four months after Australian authorities attempted to get answers from social media platforms on the steps they were taking to address child sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual extortion and the promotion of harmful content by its algorithms.

Twitter has 28 days to respond to the notice or faces a maximum financial penalty of nearly $700,000 a day for continued breaches.

Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said a third of the complaints she had received about online hate in the past 12 months were directed at Twitter.

“Twitter appears to have dropped the ball on tackling hate,” she said.

The spike in reports of serious online abuse coincides with billionaire Elon Musk’s takeover of the company in October that led to a major overhaul of its safety protocols.

Australia has slapped Twitter with legal action over an influx in hate tweets. Picture: Supplied

Within the month, 62,000 formerly banned or suspended users were reinstated to the platform, including 75 accounts with more than one million followers.

It came as Twitter’s global workforce was gutted by at least 6500 staff, including those working in teams dedicated to trust and safety programs.

Hateful conduct is prohibited under Twitter’s terms of use and policies, but Ms Inman Grant said it was clear that the social media giant was not enforcing its own rules.

“We are seeing a worrying surge in hate online,” she said.

“The level of online abuse is already inexcusably high, but if you’re a First Nations Australian, you are disabled or identify as LGBTIQ+, you experience online hate at double the rate of the rest of the population.

Repeated, targeted harassment against any account will cause the harassing accounts to receive, at minimum, temporary suspensions.

The words “cis” or “cisgender” are considered slurs on this platform.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 21, 2023

“We are also aware of reports that the reinstatement of some of these previously banned accounts has emboldened extreme polarisers, peddlers of outrage and hate, including neo-Nazis both in Australia and overseas.”

Mr Musk has threatened to suspend users for using the word “cisgender”, referring to it as a “slur”, while unprecedented levels of anti-LGBTQIA+ tweets flood the platform.

The hashtag, #CisIsNotASlur, was trending on Twitter on Thursday morning after Mr Musk responded to a tweet from a user who claims they received a “slew” of messages from trans activists for publicly rejecting the word “cis”.

“Repeated, targeted harassment against any account will cause the harassing accounts to receive, at minimum, temporary suspension,” Mr Musk replied.

“The word ‘cis’ or ‘cisgender’ are considered slurs on this platform.”

NCA NewsWire has contacted Twitter for comment.