Twitter can now take action on media that is shared without any explicit abusive content, provided it’s posted without the consent of the person depicted.
While the policy could directly impact women, and vulnerable members of the society who are often at the receiving end of targeted social media attacks, the ‘vagueness’ on implementation could make it ‘just another policy.’
Social media is often used to intimidate, harass, and share personal information of individuals – hence, it is good to see social media platforms like Twitter actively thinking about this issue, given that intimidation, harassment, involved. Twitter, in its expanded policy, has said that it will always try to assess the context in which the content is shared – and that only either the person featured or a representative can report it.
Cybersecurity experts Srinivas asserted that it is vague and the underlying problem with implementing such a policies – by not just Twitter but most social media platforms operating in India. This is a traditional problem. It is not a problem that is there with this rule – but anything that has to do with content removal – sensitive information, impersonation, Covid-19, misinformation – to name a few. This difficulty of enforcement is a larger issue – and that not lies with just Twitter. Wait and watch.