Despite Elon Musk's opaque approach, the “Twitter Files” give a peek at moderation at scale and are a win for transparency, while failing to prove systemic bias

Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, is feverishly promoting his “Twitter Files”: selected internal communications from the company …

TechCrunch 2022-12-10 Devin Coldewey

Context & Ripple Effects

The release followed reporting that the disputed moderation decision reflected staff deliberating over a difficult moderation call, rather than evidence of coordinated political intervention. It therefore opened a narrow window into how Twitter handled enforcement while leaving Musk's broader bias claim unsupported.

The episode also established a tension in Twitter's transparency posture: later coverage found no new reporting on government removal demands, while researchers said the open-sourced recommendation code lacked context needed to explain recommendations.

First-order effects

Twitter's internal moderation discussions became public through Musk's selected disclosures, giving outside audiences more visibility into enforcement decisions without substantiating systemic bias.
Musk's claim that the files exposed political misconduct is constrained by the material itself, which the related coverage characterizes as evidence of debate around a hard decision.

Second-order effects

The contrast between curated document releases and Twitter's missing government content-removal transparency reports shifts scrutiny toward whether disclosures are comprehensive enough to assess platform governance.
Researchers, journalists, and users gain more material to interrogate individual moderation choices, but limited context makes it harder to draw reliable conclusions about Twitter's broader systems.

Third-order effects

If platforms increasingly substitute selected internal records or partial code releases for standardized reporting, transparency will be judged less by volume of disclosure than by its completeness and context.
Platform-governance debates are likely to focus more sharply on disclosure rules that let outsiders distinguish isolated decisions from repeatable enforcement patterns.

The trend: Platform transparency is moving from demands for more disclosure toward demands for contextual, systematic evidence of how moderation and recommendation systems operate.

Discussion

@jeffbercovici Jeff Bercovici on x
You know what, I don't think the Twitter Files are a total nothingburger. You should be able to see what kinds of controls they put on your account just like Google shows you your ad targeting categories. Keeping that hidden from users is no fair.
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
I'm sure everyone who is claiming that it is against the law (or treason!) for a media organization to support one candidate over another (of which the Twitter files still have shown no evidence...) feels the same away about Fox News? Or nah?
@mikeisaac Rat King on x
there is an actual discussion to be had about how accounts and content are labeled and handled — it's the stuff of all social networks and transparency only comes in fits and starts over the years (usually after prodding) hard to have that convo when everything is a conspiracy ht…
@julioalexo Julio Alejandro on x
@TechCrunch @riptari Nobody cares about Ireland's privacy watchdog has to say. I'm Mexican. How is this even news?
@riptari @riptari on x
@julioalexo @TechCrunch Because Ireland in this context speaks for the EU as a whole as its Twitter's lead DPA under the bloc's GDPR - breaches of which can lead to corrective measures being ordered including penalties of up to 4% of global annual turnover
@the_nerd_skull @the_nerd_skull on x
One thing to note here. I'm not even a GDPR expert. I just do web dev for a living, and I've worked for large tech corporations, who have mandated that every developer take training courses on GDPR compliance. This is just the overall gist of what those GDPR courses say.
@the_nerd_skull @the_nerd_skull on x
And revealing PII to unauthorized parties is the biggest possible PII Handling breach. If the GDPR will fuck you for recording anonymized usage info without agreement, you don't wanna know what it'll do for improperly sharing PII.
Vox Shirin Ghaffary on x
What the Twitter files don't tell us
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
THREAD: THE TWITTER FILES PART TWO. TWITTER'S SECRET BLACKLISTS.
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
1. A new #TwitterFiles investigation reveals that teams of Twitter employees build blacklists, prevent disfavored tweets from trending, and actively limit the visibility of entire accounts or even trending topics—all in secret, without informing users.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@DavidSacks As @bariweiss clearly describes, the rules were enforced against the right, but not against the left
@ashleyfeinberg Ashley Feinberg on x
this has literally been on twitter's help page since at least 2018 https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@robferdman Roberto Aram Ferdman on x
The Twitter Files are one of the best examples out there of why editors are so important in journalism
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
28. The authors have broad and expanding access to Twitter's files. The only condition we agreed to was that the material would first be published on Twitter.
@whstancil Will Stancil on x
Bari Weiss is literally in the middle of a breathless “Twitter Files” thread describing Twitter implementing the exact policy that Elon Musk said he was going to institute three weeks ago. https://twitter.com/...
@tedlieu Ted Lieu on x
Dear @RepMTG: Have you read the First Amendment? It states “Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech.” The First Amendment prevents MAGA Republicans like you from making laws to regulate speech on @facebook @YouTube and @Twitter. Get it? https://twitter.com/..…
@darrenjbeattie Darren J. Beattie on x
Make them available to the public, no need for mediators/gatekeepers https://twitter.com/...
@jonttrubek Jont Trubek on x
After Elon straightens out Twitter, hopefully he will buy Facebook too & shit can Zuck.
@rep … Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 on x
The same communist censorship that has been exposed by Twitter files is happening on @facebook and @YouTube. It's been going on for years and there is nothing stopping it. Republicans have to end it.
@scottadamssays Scott Adams on x
Twitter indirectly answered your questions about YouTube (Google) and Facebook. Everything is exactly the way you thought it was.
@mehdirhasan Mehdi Hasan on x
Simple question: do you have access to Twitter's files under Elon Musk's ownership? If not, why not? https://twitter.com/...
@sethabramson Seth Abramson on x
I was shadowbanned in September 2020 under the very Twitter policy @ElonMusk is here falsely claiming was only applied to people on the right. It was a major topic of conversation on Twitter at the time, because I made a big stink about it. Elon is *flat-out lying* here, period. …
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Well, I finally got a response to my proposal that Musk address his concern for political interference by publishing a database of moderation actions and communications with government actors. I just literally don't know what it means. Proposal: https://twitter.com/... https://tw…
@espiers Elizabeth Spiers on x
Imagine investing money into a social network and understanding this little about content moderation and how a TOS works. https://twitter.com/...
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
So we've now had two long threads, presented as if they were revealing some big conspiracy, that basically, just... confirmed a bunch of things the company had already said publicly, and showed pretty standard (boring) trust & safety work. What a world.
@abigailshrier Abigail Shrier on x
Our team was given extensive, unfiltered access to Twitter's internal communication and systems. One of the things we wanted to know was whether Twitter systemically suppressed political speech. Here's what we found: https://twitter.com/...
@brianklaas Brian Klaas on x
This is all so tiresome. It's an entire industry that gins up outrage, and it thrives because it's really easy to take just about anything and make it sound sinister. https://twitter.com/...
@janusrose Janus Rose on x
like all reactionary “scandals” it's obvious this whole charade was designed for engagement farming - no sensible journalist will see any of this as “news,” but that's not the target audience. it's classic agitprop cherry-picked for musk's fanbase & network of right wing grifters…
@davidsacks David Sacks on x
New narrative: they weren't shadowbanning political opponents. They were just enforcing the spam policy. https://twitter.com/...
@heminator Mark Hemingway on x
This disingenuously ignores Twitter censored credible scientific voices such as @DrJBhattacharya or the fact that people got censored for questioning official COVID narratives that were factually incorrect. https://twitter.com/...
@hawleymo Josh Hawley on x
Yet how many times did I hear @jack say, including to Congress, that Twitter never targeted conservatives. And how many “reporters” repeated this lie over and over and over and over https://twitter.com/...
@jeffreyasachs Jeffrey Sachs on x
“Our team”? https://twitter.com/...
@bradmossesq Bradley P. Moss on x
I look forward to the expose by the next owner of Twitter on how Elon cherry-picked this stuff. https://twitter.com/...
@mattwalshblog Matt Walsh on x
Please give us every name and trending topic that was on the blacklist https://twitter.com/...
@hodgetwins @hodgetwins on x
And I guarantee this same thing happens at Facebook, IG, YouTube, etc https://twitter.com/...
@theplumlinegs Greg Sargent on x
Yeah, the level of grift here is just stunning, but the problem is that tweeting debunkings also fuels the grift. https://twitter.com/...
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@libsoftiktok You're welcome. Twitter won't be perfect in the future, but it will be *much* better.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@bariweiss @libsoftiktok Former head of censorship at Twitter was perhaps not entirely unbiased ... https://twitter.com/...
@dbongino Dan Bongino on x
We ALWAYS knew we were a target of the Twitter suppression machine. ALWAYS. Yet liberals insisted it was another “conspiracy theory.” Tonight is vindication, yet I expect no apologies from liberals. They live to abuse power and they'll make no apologies for doing so.
@mehdirhasan Mehdi Hasan on x
This entire thread from Weiss, and supposed exposé on Twitter's ‘secret blacklists,’ is exactly what @elonmusk says his current content moderation policy for Twitter is! https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@jason @jason on x
On top of all this twitter leadership claimed it wasn't happening, which is just peak gaslighting Social networks need to be transparent and fair in policing their services, letting Americans make their own decisions on who to follow or block.
@eliothiggins Eliot Higgins on x
Elon is going to have so much fun explaining to EU why Twitter shouldn't be regulated after all this. https://twitter.com/...
@jason @jason on x
The problem with these enforcements is threefold: 1. There was no transparency, 2 they were not evenly enforced, & 3. Shadow-banning/search banning feels underhanded (just block folks & say why). Citizens should block & mute who they want in my opinion — not the Stasi. https://tw…
@tedlieu Ted Lieu on x
This post by @elonmusk assumes the right and the left are somehow the same. We are not. Folks on the right said COVID was a hoax. Folks on the left said it was not. Twitter absolutely had the right to enforce rules against COVID deniers, who were disproportionally on the right. h…
@junlper @junlper on x
this new twitter files thread is so funny when you realize elons musk current policy is exactly what this one is complaining about https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@kylenabecker Kyle Becker on x
This was the Twitter CEO before @ElonMusk misleading users by telling them “we don't shadowban.” #TwitterFiles https://twitter.com/...
@cernovich @cernovich on x
Rolling out these twitter files in waves is exactly the way to do it.
@maxkennerly Max Kennerly on x
As expected “Twitter Files 2” is drivel. This supposedly damning evidence is from yesterday. Literally “2022-12-07,” over a month after Musk took over. Who knows what it was like before—but they currently get preferential treatment, the “SIP-PES” consult before action is taken. h…
@kimdotcom Kim Dotcom on x
🧵 Twitter files Part 2 🧵 Here are my views about the recent revelations. First of all I'm glad this information is now available to the public and I'm angry because of what was done to censor and control public discourse about important issues like corruption and Govt crimes.
@mrandyngo @mrandyngo on x
Exclusive: Bari doesn't name too many names but the head of Twitter's Strategic Response Team when secret actions were taken to stifle conservative accounts happened under Jeff Carlton, who worked for both CIA & FBI. He just deleted his LinkedIn. But I have an archive. @elonmusk …
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
I discovered this secret document (the publicly available terms of service) that says Twitter sometimes limits the distribution or visibility of content. https://twitter.com/...
@radleybalko Radley Balko on x
The Twitter Files is a good lesson in how you can report out the goings on of any decent sized organization, and if you use the right tone, cite “documents,” and make it seem like you're breaking news, you can make even the most mundane shit seem scandalous to the right audience.
@rep … Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 on x
Oversight is coming. https://twitter.com/...
@billym2k Shibetoshi Nakamoto on x
it'll be interesting when some people learn they aren't actually shadowbanned, it's just that they don't say anything worth reading
@nickmartin Nick Martin on x
The biggest takeaway from that Bari Weiss thread is that Twitter spent years finding new and creative ways to keep large conservative and right-wing accounts on the site despite some pretty egregious behavior. But that was always obvious to anyone paying attention.
@jamesmelville James Melville on x
What the latest #TwitterFiles prove is that many influential accounts who questioned lockdowns were suppressed and many pro-lockdown influencers were amplified - often to vilify and orchestrate pile ons against those who were suppressed. Musk has unearthed this rather grim truth.
@karengeier @karengeier on x
What am I supposed to be outraged at by that twitter files thing? Is it that they have a moderation policy? Is it that the examples were cherry picked and did not include anyone who was moderated for their leftist views? Is it that Bari Weiss doesn't know how to take screenshots?
@libsoftiktok @libsoftiktok on x
This screenshot is current. Notice date on the right side. I'm still on a “trends blacklist.” When will this be fixed @elonmusk? https://twitter.com/...
@timcast Tim Pool on x
this style of reporting is bad, the slow rolling of documents is bad they are drowning the potential for a big story by slow rolling it. This desensitizes people who gradually stop caring. https://twitter.com/...
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
wait what? November 21, 2022? you mean this happened when Elon Musk was running the platform? https://twitter.com/...
@edburmila Ed Burmila on x
The replies to every tweet about Elon Musk offer valuable insight into how Jonestown happened https://twitter.com/...
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
Randomly: kudos to (former?) security folks at Twitter who apparently put in place (built?) a system so that people with access to high level, extremely powerful tools (e.g. to look at other people's DMs) have watermarks on their screens in case someone, you know, takes a photo.
@ericfrohnhoefer @ericfrohnhoefer on x
“New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.” - @elonmusk 😱 OMG Twitter was already doing that shame on them. A whole lot of nothing once again. https://twitter.com/...
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
we actually did learn something from Twitter Files 2: 1) Libs of TikTok received special treatment from Twitter, regular mods weren't allowed to take action on her account 2) Libs of TikTok was doxed under owner Elon Musk, the tweet was allowed to stay up https://twitter.com/...
@bborrman Brandon on x
@ashleyfeinberg Why it's even the current guy's policy. https://twitter.com/...
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
these guys don't seem to understand that Elon Musk owns Twitter now. those former Twitter employees aren't legally responsible for this stuff. if you want to sue someone over the Twitter Files...your lawsuit would be against Twitter and Elon Musk lol https://twitter.com/...
@goldman Jason Goldman on x
Literally the only thing Elon has managed to launch is a gamergate retread
@ashleyfeinberg Ashley Feinberg on x
lmao “secret group”—you're telling me the company's highest-ranking people would talk to each other before making decisions that could have particularly sensitive consequences?? and they didn't inform ME about it?? https://twitter.com/...
@goldman Jason Goldman on x
She's uncovered the scandal of {reduce remove inform} as the triad of content moderation that's existed since these features launched. Even Elon says there is no freedom of reach. This is just winding up a thirsty audience who will swallow sand to feel heated by conspiracy. https…
@david_j_roth David Roth on x
Savvy move by Musk here. Giving Bari Slack access has been proven to be one of the best ways to motivate employees to think about quitting. https://twitter.com/...
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
Elon: I have a great new idea: we will diminish visibility of bad stuff. “No freedom of reach.” Bari Weiss: Look at how EVIL Twitter was: they limited the reach of some nonsense purveyors. Elon fans: OMG, thank you Elon for saving us!
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
just need to point out that apparently Bari Weiss does not know how to take screenshots? she's taking photos of her computer screen lol https://twitter.com/...
@kt_so_it_goes @kt_so_it_goes on x
it's me. I'm the twitter files lady. I used to do other real weird shit until I saw taibbi & greenwald & said hey I gotta get in on that action. I'm the twitter files lady now. soon I'll be posting their sewer bill saying HMMM MAKES YOU THINK. anyway. I'm the twitter files lady. …
@tomscocca Tom Scocca on x
I don't understand what L*bs of T*ktok was doing wrong, also I had to quit the New York Times because my coworkers used mean emoji, or at least it felt to me like they were using mean emoji
@normcharlatan Norm Charlatan on x
Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi are the white Diamond and Silk.
@jeremylittau Jeremy Littau on x
I guess it's Galaxy Brain Variety Hour again on the bird app. The. New. Owner. Said. In. November. He. Would. Do. The. Same. Thing. You. Think. Is. A. Scandal. https://twitter.com/...
@karaswisher Kara Swisher on x
Btw, yes, it is dripping with irony that this dude who sits atop a fortune built on OPD (other people's data) used by Facebook — KGB to Twitter's Stasi in his labored and historically ignorant metaphor — is typing this kind of dark nonsense.
@karaswisher Kara Swisher on x
Was it not Alexander Hamilton who said all tweets MUST be amplified under the little known 56th amendment that this Meta/Facebook board member is apparently and darkly referring to? https://twitter.com/...
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
12. The group that decided whether to limit the reach of certain users was the Strategic Response Team - Global Escalation Team, or SRT-GET. It often handled up to 200 “cases” a day.
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
What? Bari Weiss misrepresenting stuff to fanboys to make a big conspiracy out of something that is clearly not a big conspiracy? How... not surprising. https://twitter.com/...
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
14. This secret group included Head of Legal, Policy, and Trust (Vijaya Gadde), the Global Head of Trust & Safety (Yoel Roth), subsequent CEOs Jack Dorsey and Parag Agrawal, and others.
@annecollier @annecollier on x
Three of us resigned from Twitter's Trust & Safety Council today: @eirliani @podesta_lesley and me. Here's why https://www.netfamilynews.org/ ... https://twitter.com/...
@ellagirwin Ella Irwin on x
@thetomzone Correct. For security purposes, the screenshots requested came from me so we could ensure no PII was exposed. We did not give this access to reporters and no, reporters were not accessing user DMs.
@justinbaragona Justin Baragona on x
“Now, Weiss has been given access to Twitter's employee systems, added to its Slack, and given a company laptop, two people familiar with her presence said. The level of access to Twitter systems given to Weiss is typically given only to employees...” https://www.businessinsider.…
@abgutman Abraham Gutman on x
.@elonmusk, yes or no — do Weiss and Taibbi have access to users' DMs? It would be good to get clear explanation about this screen and yes/no answer to this straightforward question. https://twitter.com/...
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
16. One of the accounts that rose to this level of scrutiny was @libsoftiktok—an account that was on the “Trends Blacklist” and was designated as “Do Not Take Action on User Without Consulting With SIP-PES.” https://twitter.com/...
@daveyalba Davey Alba on x
Summing the reactions of ex-Twitter workers to “The Twitter Files Pt 2” Ex-employees seemingly saying three main things: 1) This has long been public; 2) The platform features called out are innocuous; 3) The new T&S head handed everything over, making this little more than PR ht…
@unusual_whales @unusual_whales on x
BREAKING: Twitter Files released by Elon Musk, Matt Taibbi & Bari Weiss, have suggested that a secret group headed by Vijaya Gadde, the Head of Legal, Yoel Roth, the Head of Trust, CEOs Jack Dorsey & Parag, & others, made decisions secretly & without overview to moderate Twitter.
@spdustin @spdustin on x
@44 @emptywheel eirwin4903ZWlyd21u863, repeated over and over on all the screenshots from that internal tool. https://twitter.com/...
@jeremylittau Jeremy Littau on x
Can think of several moments when as a young reporter I thought I had a bombshell story and then it became a merely average story or not news at all after an editor poked at it with skeptical questions. Beware media folks who think they're too big-brained for editorial standards.…
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Feels like Weiss' thread should be enough for the FTC to open an investigation into a violation of the consent decree and perhaps get a subpoena for Twitter's internal access logs.
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
everything that Bari Weiss is currently “breaking” as part of Twitter Files 2 has been reported on and known about for two and a half years https://www.vice.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@scottjshapiro @scottjshapiro on x
BREAKING: Explosive evidence from the #GoogleFiles showing that Google runs a program called “AdSense” through which website publishers pay *money* to serve *advertisements* *targeting* the site *audience*.
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@unusual_whales Controversial decisions were often made without getting Jack's approval and he was unaware of systemic bias. The inmates were running the asylum. Jack has a pure heart imo.
@esqueer_ Alejandra Caraballo on x
Did Elon just give Bari Weiss and Abigail Shrier access to everyone's DM's? This would be a clear violation of the Stored Communications Act by sharing with them. Not to mention, potentially handing the most transphobic “journalists” access to trans people is dangerous. https://t…
@jeffbercovici Jeff Bercovici on x
How did Bari Weiss become a member of Elon Musk's inner circle? We'll never know. https://twitter.com/...
@donmoyn Don Moynihan on x
The people Twitter appointed to offer an outside perspective on trust and safety are basically saying that Musk's reassurances on safety can't be trusted. No doubt Musk will just label them as “woke” and move on, but this seems like a big deal. https://twitter.com/...
@gallagherfergal Fergal Gallagher on x
Good piece on how the Twitter Files are just part of Elon's general temper tantrum. Gem of a line summing up the whole problem with social media platforms 1/2 https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
@nickmartin Nick Martin on x
The right has pushed the narrative that tech companies were biased against conservatives, but that's always been a lie. Researchers have repeatedly found big social media platforms like Twitter favor conservatives. Twitter's own research even said so. https://www.theverge.com/...
@pwnallthethings @pwnallthethings on x
“without overview” is a funny way to describe a group comprising the CEO and the main heads of departments. https://twitter.com/...
@orinkerr Orin Kerr on x
<Looks at his mentions, sees people wondering if Bari Weiss violated the Stored Communications Act by looking through private DM's with Twitter's permission but not that of sender/receivers.> Nope, no violation, see the 18 U.S.C. 2701(c)(1) exception. https://www.law.cornell.edu/…
@sarahfrier Sarah Frier on x
If you zoom in on the images shared by Bari Weiss yesterday, you'll see they carry a watermark that shows they were taken via the account of Ella Irwin, Twitter's head of trust and safety: https://www.bloomberg.com/...
@willoremus Will Oremus on x
There are some mildly interesting details in here but presenting it as some new and shocking and secret finding is either ignorant or disingenuous. There have been whole news cycles about Twitter shadowbans. I know because I've written about them multiple times over the years. ht…
@emptywheel @emptywheel on x
So Twitter replaced a department full of communications professionals whom journalists could call with two pundits with a grievance and flimsy grasp of basic logic?
@the_nerd_skull @the_nerd_skull on x
And now we have word that Musk has revealed PII (Personally identifiable information) to outside actors without permission. This is the absolute biggest no-no in the entire GDPR framework.
@donmoyn Don Moynihan on x
If there is litigation or any federal/EU investigation, not sure how well the “well yes, we had a General Counsel who advised against this, but we fired him” defense will play https://twitter.com/...
@stevanzetti @stevanzetti on x
Ey, what's an FTC reportable security incident between friends, forget about it https://twitter.com/...
@jeremylittau Jeremy Littau on x
Consider their constant claims of “bombshell” as a necessary side effect of going it alone. They have to overhype everything to keep their paid subs, spin banal data into conspiracy. Otherwise there is no rationale to pay for paid propaganda you can get for free anywhere.
@jamessurowiecki James Surowiecki on x
Bari Weiss didn't describe anything of the sort. And Taibbi explicitly said that Twitter took down material at the request of the Trump White House. https://twitter.com/...
@charlesarthur Charles Arthur on x
Bhattacharya is one of the people allegedly “suppressed” in the latest round of “we discover that social media companies have internal systems and groups” brainboiling. https://twitter.com/...
@scottjshapiro @scottjshapiro on x
Breaking: Content moderators at Twitter moderated content on Twitter.
@ted_scheinman Ted Scheinman on x
“Taibbi's willingness to caper about while Musk clapped his hands, in itself, instantly recreated the very power structure that his reporting was supposedly meant to assail....” — @ToLey88: https://defector.com/... via @DefectorMedia https://twitter.com/...
@thetomzone Tom Mckay on x
uh well, here's the new head of Twitter trust and safety saying she's the one taking photos of the moderation backend for Bari Weiss https://twitter.com/...
@dancow Dan Nguyen on x
Seriously, this just underscores how flawed & limited Weiss's reporting has been so far. OK let's compare Maddow & E. Klein to C. Kirk and Bongino — can you screencap their internal profiles, @jason? Do either Maddow / Klein have a “Recent Abuse Strike”? Or “SPMA”? What is SPMA? …
@daveyalba Davey Alba on x
3) The T&S head handed everything over, making this little more than PR. People pointed out last night that Bari's screenshots included new Twitter T&S head Ella Irwin's LDAP in the background, and she admitted to handing everything over in her own tweet https://twitter.com/...
@thatianelliott @thatianelliott on x
This is absurd! The new head of Twitter's Trust and Safety, just out here openly admitting she's not even smart enough to cover own own ass, admitting the “journalists” on the Twitter Files lied about their access, and admitting there was no methodology. Enjoy the courts, Ella. h…
@qjurecic Quinta Jurecic on x
my takeaway so far is that the folks involved in this mini-episode may not fully understand a) the SCA and b) journalism https://twitter.com/...
@zoeschiffer Zoë Schiffer on x
Twitter's new head of trust and safety says the company did not give reporters access to peoples' DMs. The screenshots came from her, she says: https://twitter.com/...
@44 @44 on x
The Twitter files continue to be a big dud, already long-public information presented as scandal. The real story here is third parties getting uncontrolled access to tooling which reveals private information of Twitter users. This is bad, and seems to be escalating. https://twitt…
@nicoleperlroth Nicole Perlroth on x
I have never felt such second hand embarrassment as I do for the “Twitter Files” “journalists.” There's just no coming back from this. https://twitter.com/...
@karaswisher Kara Swisher on x
Business translator: “Secret group” aka public company management, who are described in all regulatory filings in copious detail, whose job it is to deal with such sensitive issues and — stick with me here since it is apparently murky to some — run the company. https://twitter.co…
@parismarx Paris Marx on x
Here's Elon Musk promising Libs of TikTok that he'll ensure the account's posts — which explicitly target queer and trans folks with violence — won't be suppressed on the platform. https://twitter.com/...
@willoremus Will Oremus on x
“secret group” and “without overview” are very funny ways to describe a group of decision-makers at a company that included the CEO, CTO, general counsel, and head of trust and safety. https://twitter.com/...
@orinkerr Orin Kerr on x
The more important question: Is Twitter civilly liable for giving private communications to Weiss? If they disclosed private user DMs, yes, they probably are liable, under 2702 and 2707. https://twitter.com/...
@saletan Will Saletan on x
Feels like there's 2 layers to these Musk crusades. 1. The analysis written by the Musk-approved journalist who was given the material. 2. The overstated version Musk wanted in the first place, so he just goes ahead and puts that out to the world, with the journalist as cover. ht…
@whiteroseafa @whiteroseafa on x
Elon gave Bari Weiss access to people's DMs and shit? https://twitter.com/...
@thetomzone Tom Mckay on x
this couldn't possibly be new twitter head of trust and safety Ella Irwin (@ellagirwin) letting Bari Weiss rifle around in a backend tool that clearly says “Direct Messages” in the sidebar could it? 🤔 https://twitter.com/...
@zaleskiluke Luke Zaleski on x
Elon Musk Brings in Cousins, Confidants, and Bari Weiss to Twitter https://www.businessinsider.com/ ...
@nkulw Noah Kulwin on x
Elon musk trying to drive engagement on Twitter by letting attention-hungry narcissists root around in corporate history so long as they publish stuff that doesn't hurt musk and they also publish it on Twitter in the form of tedious threads https://twitter.com/...
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
a secret group made decisions secretly without overview and who was on that group, folks? the CEO of the company and the head of every relevant department lol do you hear what you're saying? these are the very people who would overview these decisions https://twitter.com/...
@parismarx Paris Marx on x
With the “Twitter Files,” Musk isn't so much revealing things about Twitter we didn't know, but using former journalists to rewrite Twitter's history — at least for the cult and the right-wing — in a way that serves him, his insider circle, and the right-wing media ecosystem. htt…
@atrupar Aaron Rupar on x
Musk is trying to turn Twitter into a Project Veritas message board
@joshuaphilll @joshuaphilll on x
Oh my god. Stochastic terrorist wants a larger reach and Musk is looking into it https://twitter.com/...
@radiofreetom Tom Nichols on x
One thing Trump spread across the American right: The inability (or unwillingness, or indifference) to remembering anything from five minutes ago https://twitter.com/...
@parismarx Paris Marx on x
Probably a good time to remind everyone that regardless of what Elon Musk, his reactionary advisors, and fake journalists want you to believe, Twitter admitted its algorithms were biased in favor of right-wing accounts just last year. https://www.theguardian.com/ ...
@anthony Anthony DeRosa on x
In October last year, Twitter shared that its algorithm promotes right-leaning content more often than left — but the reasons for that remain unclear. The findings drew from an internal study on Twitter's algorithmic amplification of political content https://www.theverge.com/...
@adrianweckler Adrian Weckler on x
Hope Elon and his new execs didn't let this investigative unit rifle through user DMs. They're supposed to be private. Level of access still unclear. If DMs exposed, @DPCIreland might be interested. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@tomscocca Tom Scocca on x
How did they know which DMs to request screenshots of https://twitter.com/...
@amuse @amuse on x
Democrats are asking Biden's FTC to investigate @elonmusk for allowing @mtaibbi and @bariweiss to access Twitter's internal systems and documents. They argue there is no ‘business purpose’ in providing access that is being used to prove malfeasance. https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/ .…
@carlquintanilla Carl Quintanilla on x
“.. Feels like Weiss' thread should be enough for the @FTC to open an investigation into a violation of the consent decree and perhaps get a subpoena for #Twitter's internal access logs ..” @business ⁦@alexstamos⁩ https://www.bloomberg.com/...
@noahgarfinkel Noah Garfinkel on x
The Twitter Files thing feels like someone reading a recipe with a suspicious angry voice for no reason. After padding the chicken dry, it says to salt AND pepper BOTH sides before dredging it in egg and flour that was NEVER SIFTED.
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Hopefully that button doesn't actually work for them; Twitter has put a lot of work into internal access controls. If those two have been provisioned DM access, I expect that's, at a minimum, an FTC reportable security incident.
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
what Bari Weiss is “unveiling” in her Twitter Files part 2 is also how Elon Musk said he was going to run content moderation on the platform https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@juliusgoat @juliusgoat on x
Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss are like Woodwood & Bernstein, if Woodward & Bernstein never learned investigative reporting, and were hired by Nixon to break into Democratic Committee HQ, and then documented the break-in and the theft. https://twitter.com/...
@tupp_ed @tupp_ed on x
Personal Data, under Article 4 of the GDPR, is a wider term than the US concept of PII. I see plenty of Personal Data being disclosed in this screenshot. I have trouble working out which Article 6 legal basis for data processing would cover it. https://twitter.com/...
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
lol wait this shows Libs of TikTok got special treatment from Twitter DO NOT TAKE ACTION ON USER https://twitter.com/...
@jtlol @jtlol on x
If so, who had access to it before Musk was in charge? https://twitter.com/...
@ellagirwin Ella Irwin on x
@MrAndyNgo @elonmusk Yes. Jeff works for me, which is why I can correct this info. He has been at Twitter since 2021 but working in a different role. He recently stepped into his new role as part of Twitter 2.0 and has been integral in helping us drive transparency and fairness.
@elizableu Eliza on x
I'm not going to lie the new Twitter trust and safety folks are really cool.
@spdustin @spdustin on x
@44 @emptywheel In other words, Ella Irwin (who took over Trust and Safety from @yoyoel) is likely the logged in account for those screenshots. https://twitter.com/...
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
Truth brings reconciliation
@jolyonmaugham Jo Maugham on x
It would be a brave decision to continue to use Twitter DMs to send confidential information... https://twitter.com/...
@izzykamikaze @izzykamikaze on x
It looks like selected right-wing churnalists are being given privileged access to all your personal data on Twitter, including your DMs. Hopefully The Mother of All Data Protection cases is pending, but anybody who isn't far right should be thinking of abandoning Twitter ASAP. h…
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
this is a great catch. Bari Weiss' Twitter Files pics all have the same watermark on them. either she was provided a login to a specific employees account or she is physically standing over the Twitter employee told to give her this access snapping pics https://twitter.com/...
@radiofreetom Tom Nichols on x
The big reveal about Twitter moderation is a classic death of expertise moment: people who didn't know about something until now assume not knowing about it meant that it was a huge secret
@michaelehayden Michael Edison Hayden on x
Bari Weiss wants you to find it nefarious that Twitter did the bare minimum in limiting the reach of anti-LGBTQ+ bigot Chaya Raichik. Any responsible company would have suspended Libs of Tik Tok before it got such a big audience. https://twitter.com/...
@rvawonk Caroline Orr Bueno, Ph.D on x
Everything Bari Weiss is tweeting about was already widely known. Furthermore, Elon Musk literally just publicly announced 5 days ago the same policy she's presenting as a secret in her 2nd tweet. https://twitter.com/...
@parismarx Paris Marx on x
This account's whole purpose is to direct violence and hatred at various individuals and groups, including queer and trans folks. But Bari Weiss and Elon Musk are out here defending it and allowing it to pretend it never broke any rules. Absolutely vile. https://twitter.com/...
@stevanzetti @stevanzetti on x
The Bari Weiss version of the Twitter Files basically is that a social media company has moderation tools that are not entirely public in nature and that a leadership committee talked to each other about high profile moderation decisions — but told like it's Watergate.
@theserfstv @theserfstv on x
The new Twitter files have revealed that Libs of TikTok, despite the dangers she presented to schools and hospitals, actually GOT preferential protection! https://twitter.com/...
@srirachachau Mr. Chau on x
This is the opposite of a ban...what are you talking about https://twitter.com/...
@marinamedvin @marinamedvin on x
BTW Twitter employees can see your DMs https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@bariweiss @libsoftiktok 🤨 https://twitter.com/...
@robferdman Roberto Aram Ferdman on x
The most obvious and hilarious PR campaign masquerading as investigative journalism you will ever see https://twitter.com/...
@donmoyn Don Moynihan on x
Weiss is an opinion writer/activist, not an investigative journalist. Her whole MO is to look for stories that might be generally unrepresentative, but reflect her worldview, and not do any additional digging that challenges that worldview. View the scoops that follow accordingly…
@eladnehorai Elad Nehorai on x
So Bari Weiss, one of the loudest anti-"cancel culture" warriors and supposed fighter of antisemitism is: 1. Destroying the lives of former Twitter employees. 2. Working with a man who has done more to spread antisemitism in the past month than anyone in America. https://twitter.…
@wilson__valdez @wilson__valdez on x
Bari Weiss, anti-cancel culture warrior, combing through people's private communications in order to find something to ‘cancel’ them with, is just too too on point. https://twitter.com/...
@7im @7im on x
it's a strange world where @catturd2 is verified ($8) and twitter's head of trust and safety has no blue check at all https://twitter.com/...
@pattymo Patrick Monahan on x
Seems like a fair question, in the interest of transparency or whatever the Dork Squad is pretending this is about https://twitter.com/...
@themaxburns Max Burns on x
The guy who was supposedly worried about Big Tech snooping on people has given Bari Weiss access to your DMs. https://twitter.com/...
@ariehkovler Arieh Kovler on x
A couple of weeks ago, Musk and his team were boasting about how Twitter under his leadership would aggressively deamplify hate speech. So this whole kerfuffle isn't about the principle of deamplification. It's just about who gets deamplified and who gets to decide.
@respectablelaw @respectablelaw on x
@ellagirwin @thetomzone “The screenshots requested” is very interesting language that suggests this was likely an even bigger clown show than many suspected.
@wilson__valdez @wilson__valdez on x
So here's Twitter's new head of Trust and Safety saying she gave Bari the ‘screenshots requested’. So if this is accurate, it's confirmation of the obvious: that they're just cherry-picking shit for their narrative and they have no clue whether their ‘full picture’ is true. https…
@emptywheel @emptywheel on x
There is literally NO WAY Weiss is doing real research w/o assessing non-right wing accounts. It's either a cherry pick or a privacy violation. https://twitter.com/...
@hannahgais Hannah Gais on x
the current head of twitter trust and safety just verified that she's the source of the photos of a screen that bari weiss posted showing twitter's backend. https://twitter.com/...
@nycsouthpaw @nycsouthpaw on x
The new head of twitter trust and safety admits to this skullduggery only after someone notices a watermark containing her id on the screens she photographed and gave to Weiss et al. https://twitter.com/...
@golikehellmachi @golikehellmachi on x
musk let weiss and taibbi direct several more existential asteroids at twitter on the same day musk's creditors started considering whether they should start taking bites out of tesla as collateral https://twitter.com/...
@eliothiggins Eliot Higgins on x
I hope Elon and pals are working in their answers to assure EU officials journalists definitely didn't have access to private DMs https://twitter.com/...
@hannahgais Hannah Gais on x
taibbi et al. can get mad about their little stunt being portrayed as PR, but no real journalist would take and then use a computer provided to them by a source as if it's a gift like this. nothing about this is ethical. https://twitter.com/...
@ted_scheinman Ted Scheinman on x
so bari weiss is doing: a.) an internal witch-hunt for a private company and b.) external PR for said company no real journalist would agree to this unholy amalgamation. the basest hackery. https://twitter.com/...
@parkermolloy Parker Molloy on x
How funny was it the other day when a bunch of right-wingers were like, “How DARE you suggest that Taibbi was doing PR for the richest man on earth! This is journalism!” and now Weiss is just straight up being plugged into Twitter's system. It's PR. For the richest man on Earth. …
@sarahposner Sarah Posner on x
Has Musk brought on Bari to deflect attention from the fact that he's bringing actual Nazis back to the platform, using her (a purported arbiter of what is antisemitic) as a shield against that criticism https://www.businessinsider.com/ ...
@jaredlholt Jared Holt on x
If Bari isn't taking money from Elon already she might as well just do it since that seems to be the only tangible thing separating her from other Twitter employees in this charade. If you're gonna be a billionaire's minion might as well get in on the take https://twitter.com/...
@edzitron Ed Zitron on x
is this not quite literally media corruption https://twitter.com/...
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
@MarinaMedvin DMs should be encrypted, so that it is impossible for anyone at Twitter to see the public's DMs, just as is the case with Signal or iMessage
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Prof. Kerr confirms my hunch that Twitter would face liability under the SCA if they do give anybody access to DMs or release them publicly: https://twitter.com/...
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
The new head of T&S denies that Weiss and team have access to DMs, which has to be squared with claims that their access was extensive and unfiltered. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@charliekirk11 Charlie Kirk on x
I'm happy Elon Musk and Bari Weiss have confirmed my account was targeted, but every Twitter user deserves to know if they too were targeted in some way. Twitter should publicly release ALL information on shadowbans, no matter how large or small the target was. Let the truth out.
@jason_kint Jason Kint on x
“Freedom of speech does not mean freedom of reach” - elmo repeating what civil society has been saying for five years. https://twitter.com/...
@wongmjane Jane Manchun Wong on x
I want Twitter Files Part #3, where someone literally takes pictures of all the secretive internal feature prototypes https://twitter.com/...
@bariweiss Bari Weiss on x
23. In internal Slack messages, Twitter employees spoke of using technicalities to restrict the visibility of tweets and subjects. Here's Yoel Roth, Twitter's then Global Head of Trust & Safety, in a direct message to a colleague in early 2021: https://twitter.com/...
@joshuatopolsky Joshua Topolsky on x
The actual scandal is these two creeps and who knows who else seem to have unfettered access to your Twitter account at the behest and encouragement of the company's CEO https://twitter.com/...
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on x
No wonder every C-level executive responsible for privacy and compliance resigned. When under an FTC consent decree, it's not even appropriate for all employees to have access to such screens let alone random outsiders who're given access for clout. https://twitter.com/...
@alexstamos Alex Stamos on x
Musk fired the lawyer responsible for telling him what happens if Weiss or Taibbi click that button. https://twitter.com/...
@elonmusk Elon Musk on x
Twitter is working on a software update that will show your true account status, so you know clearly if you've been shadowbanned, the reason why and how to appeal
@bendreyfuss Ben Dreyfuss on x
I'm sorry but this is ridiculous. This might be the definition of shadowbanning that some people use, but it is explicitly not the definition that Twitter was using in that blog post https://twitter.com/...
@esesci @esesci on x
so, this change removes shadowbanning. that means the offenders would cycle identities faster, reducing the effectiveness of blocks and hindering perceived site quality. it might have macro consequences. https://twitter.com/...
@mmasnick Mike Masnick on x
Just highlighting that if you were, you know, paying attention to all this stuff, this was all well known. (Check the date). https://twitter.com/...
@binarybits Timothy B. Lee on x
I think part of the reason @bariweiss's scoop has been so polarizing is that the right and left each had well-established definitions of the term “shadow-ban,” but they weren't the same. https://twitter.com/...
@hughhewitt Hugh Hewitt on x
It is a publicly traded company whose executives testified to Congress and which made public statements and SEC filings on which investors relied. If you minimize any fraud in the filings or deception in testimony, you are encouraging every company to do the same. https://twitter…
@austincarr Austin Carr on x
This would be a healthy feature, depending on implementation. If Elon's mission is to make Twitter “by far the most accurate source of information about the world,” it'll be a fine line between his T&S policies and creating a SF-based Ministry of Truth https://twitter.com/...
@mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x
To “shadow ban” is obviously not a term with a firmly established legal definition but when Old Regime Twitter officially denied shadowbanning they offered a specific, narrowly framed definition that seems consistent with New Regime Twitter's revelations. https://twitter.com/...
@austincarr Austin Carr on x
Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants. @elonmusk, will you commit to making public any list of accounts you de-amplify going forward? With reasons for “strike” counts? Or if you have another system to control “free speech vs. free reach,” how will you be transparent? h…
@normative Julian Sanchez on x
Also it would be very weird to deny Twitter does deamplification given that they've openly said they do it for years, and it's been widely reported on in the mainstream press. Whether they do it in a biased way is another question. https://twitter.com/...
@kevinmkruse Kevin M. Kruse on x
“Shadowbanning” means making a user's tweets visible only to the user themselves, and no one else. “De-amplifying” is not the same thing, no matter how much people want to move the goalposts now. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@steventdennis Steven Dennis on x
Hundreds of millions of users and a couple thousand workers. Who is going to handle these appeals? https://twitter.com/...
@cwarzel @cwarzel on x
and of course none of that matters. if it's packaged and sold as a secret revelation it will be taken as an investigatory revelation. doesn't matter that musk has mentioned instituting a similar policy as far back as Nov 18th as the one mentioned in the “we don't shadow ban” post…
@hkanji Hussein Kanji on x
This happened to me at Facebook three or four times so I deleted the app and switched to Twitter https://twitter.com/...
@martinsfp @martinsfp on x
The second instalment of ‘the Twitter Files’ was largely more hand-wavy misrepresentation of normal moderation processes with no evidence of the ideological bias that it clearly wanted to show... but this sounds like a good feature. https://twitter.com/...
@miltonwolfmd Milton Wolf on x
Why would anyone need to appeal to @Twitter to eliminate their shadow ban, @elonmusk? Especially since Twitter claimed it didn't happen in the first place. Shouldn't Twitter just eliminate all shadow bans (and inform those affected)? https://twitter.com/...
@tedlieu Ted Lieu on x
Dear MAGA folks: This is Twitter asserting its right to ban you. Or not. Or to promote cute cat videos over posts by @bariweiss. Or to have “Twitter files”. Or to accelerate posts about the Browns. Or decelerate posts about kale. Twitter is a business. Get it? https://twitter.com…
@shefvaidya Shefali Vaidya. on x
Much needed. My reach used to be in 1000s of RTs, it has been down to tens now, follower count has been reducing, despite new follower notifications every day. Vijaya Gadde and Co were toxic haters! @elonmusk https://twitter.com/...
@lexfridman Lex Fridman on x
@elonmusk This is amazing. Increased transparency is great for everyone.
@sanjeevsanyal Sanjeev Sanyal on x
In other words, shadow banning is real....... https://twitter.com/...
@seanmdav Sean Davis on x
So we are going to have to “appeal” to the same bureaucracy responsible for improperly shadow-banning us (and then lying about it for years)? How about running a single line of code that just removes the shadow-bans immediately? Justice delayed is justice denied... https://twitte…

Chronicles