Reporting, Reviewing, and Responding to Harassment on Twitter

63 Pages Posted: 15 May 2015

See all articles by J. Matias

J. Matias

Independent

Amy Johnson

Independent

Whitney Erin Boesel

Independent

Brian Keegan

Women, Action & the Media

Jaclyn Friedman

Women, Action & the Media

Charlie DeTar

Women, Action & the Media

Date Written: May 13, 2015

Abstract

When people experience harassment online, from individual threats or invective to coordinated campaigns of harassment, they have the option to report the harassers and content to the platform where the harassment has occurred. Platforms then evaluate harassment reports against terms of use and other policies to decide whether to remove content or take action against the alleged harasser — or not. On Twitter, harassing accounts can be deleted entirely, suspended (with content made unavailable pending appeal or specific changes), or sent a warning. Some platforms, including Twitter and YouTube, grant "authorized reporters" or "trusted flaggers" special privileges to identify and report inappropriate content on behalf of others.

In November 2014, Twitter granted Women, Action, and the Media (WAM!) this authorized reporter status. From November 6–26 2014, WAM! took in reports of Twitter-based harassment, assessed them, and escalated reports as necessary to Twitter for special attention. WAM! used a special intake form to collect data and promised publicly to publish what it learned from the data it collected. In three weeks, WAM! reviewers assessed 811 incoming reports of harassment and escalated 161 reports to Twitter, ultimately seeing Twitter carry out 70 account suspensions, 18 warnings, and one deleted account. This document presents findings from this three-week project; it draws on both quantitative and qualitative methods.

Findings focus on the people reporting and receiving harassment, the kinds of harassment that were reported, Twitter’s response to harassment reports, the process of reviewing harassment reports, and challenges for harassment reporting processes.

Keywords: Online harassment, Twitter, Cyberbullying, Mixed methods

Suggested Citation

Matias, J. and Johnson, Amy and Boesel, Whitney Erin and Keegan, Brian and Friedman, Jaclyn and DeTar, Charlie, Reporting, Reviewing, and Responding to Harassment on Twitter (May 13, 2015). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2602018

Amy Johnson

Independent ( email )

Whitney Erin Boesel

Independent ( email )

Brian Keegan

Women, Action & the Media ( email )

7 Temple Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
United States

Jaclyn Friedman

Women, Action & the Media ( email )

7 Temple Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
United States

Charlie DeTar

Women, Action & the Media ( email )

7 Temple Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
United States

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