Twitter rolls out new policies to curb abuse, trolling
San Francisco, June 27 : To address abuse and trolls on its platform, Twitter has introduced new policies on hateful conduct and violent extremism, including a plan to bring in new technology and staff to fight spam and abuse.
The micro-blogging platform said that in May, its systems identified and challenged more than 9.9 million potentially "spammy" or automated accounts per week -- up from 6.4 million in December and 3.2 million in September 2017.
"To make it harder to register spam accounts, we're going to require new accounts to confirm either an email address or phone number when they sign up to Twitter.
"This is an important change to defend against people who try to take advantage of our openness," Twitter said in a blog post late on Tuesday.
"Due to technology and process improvements during the past year, we are now removing 214 per cent more accounts for violating our spam policies on a year-on-year basis," it added.
Twitter saw a drop in the average number of spam reports -- from an average of approximately 25,000 per day in March, to approximately 17,000 per day in May.
"We've also seen a 10 per cent drop in spam reports from search as a result of our recent changes. These decreases in reports received means people are encountering less spam in their timeline, search, and across the Twitter product," the company said.
Twitter currently has 330 million user accounts.
"We're also moving rapidly to curb spam and abuse originating via Twitter's APIs. In Q1 2018, we suspended more than 142,000 applications in violation of our rules -- collectively responsible for more than 130 million low-quality, spammy tweets," the blog post said.
To reduce the visibility of suspicious accounts in Tweet and account metrics, the company said it has started updating account metrics in near-real time.
"For example, the number of followers an account has, or the number of likes or Retweets a Tweet receives, will be correctly updated when we take action on accounts," it added.
Twitter is also conducting an audit to secure a number of legacy systems used to create accounts.
"The new protections we've developed as a result of this audit have already helped us prevent more than 50,000 spammy signups per day," the company said.
Twitter is also automating some processes where it sees suspicious account activity, like exceptionally high-volume tweeting with the same hashtag, or using the same @handle without a reply from the account a user has mentioned.
Twitter said it will continue to invest in leveraging Machine Learning (ML) technology and partnerships with third parties.
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Krunal's rare IPL fifty helps RCB beat DC and extend unbeaten away run
RCB jump to top of IPL 2025 points table
New Delhi, Apr 27 (PTI): Krunal Pandya recorded his first fifty in IPL since 2016, helping Royal Challengers Bengaluru pull off a six-wicket win over Delhi Capitals on a challenging Feroz Shah Kotla track here on Sunday.
Krunal (73 not out of 47 balls), who has part of every IPL season since his debut in 2016, paced his innings perfectly while batting alongside chase master Virat Kohli (51 off 47).
The duo shared a 119-run stand off 84 balls as RCB chased down 163 in 18.3 overs to extend their unbeaten run away from home.
RCB bowlers put a squeeze on Delhi Capitals in the middle overs through Josh Hazlewood and the spinners to limit the home team to 162 for six.
For RCB, it was their seventh win in 10 games while DC suffered only their third loss in nine matches. Both teams are on course to make the play-offs.
At 26 for three, RCB felt the heat before Krunal and Kohli bailed them out.
In his maiden season for RCB, Krunal has made valuable contributions with both bat and ball.
On Sunday night, Kohli played the perfect anchor as Krunal came up with timely hits on a difficult surface to deliver a fine win for his team. His straight hit through the line off Mukesh Kumar and an aerial drive over cover off the wily Kuldeep Yadav stood out among his four sixes.
Kohli's consistency has been remarkable this season and the knock against DC was his sixth 50-plus score in 10 innings. The highlight of his solid effort was the straight drive off Mitchell Starc.
The night, however, belonged to Krunal who collected only his second 50-plus score in 116 IPL innings.
Earlier, K L Rahul (41 off 39 balls) was the top-scorer for DC but it was Tristian Stubbs (34 off 18 balls) who helped the hosts post a fighting total.
RCB put the opposition in to bat, expecting better batting conditions during the run chase.
Faf du Plessis (22 off 26 balls) returned from injury to join Abhishek Porel (28 off 11) at the top of the order but it was the latter who ensured DC reached 52 for two in the powerplay.
The southpaw, who has been in fine form this season, came up with a couple of sizzling sixes in his entertaining cameo. Both came off Bhuvneshwar Kumar -- one was a left-handed hit over mid-wicket and the second was a pick-up shot over fine leg.
As veteran du Plessis struggled to get going at the other end, Porel found the ropes with relative ease.
Lead RCB pacer Hazlewood, who has been relentless with his hard lengths, took three balls to get the breakthrough as he cramped Porel to have him caught behind down the leg side.
Karun Nair, who began with a short arm pull off Hazlewood for a boundary, played an ordinary shot off Yash Dayal in the following over and his mishit was pouched at mid-wicket.
The spinners got into operation after the powerplay and overs 7-10 was the phase when RCB were able to stem the flow of runs, conceding just 20 runs off the four overs from Suyash Sharma and Krunal Pandya, who got rid of du Plessis in that period.
It was only towards the end of the innings that DC managed to get some momentum, all thanks to the blitzkrieg from Stubbs.
The 18th and 19th over from Hazlewood and Dayal yielded 17 and 19 runs, enabling DC to cross the 160-run mark.
Brief Scores:
Delhi Capitals: 162 for 8 in 20 overs (KL Rahul 41; Bhuveshwar Kumar 3/33).
Royal Challengers Bengaluru: 165 for 4 in 18.3 overs (Krunal Pandya 73, Virat Kohli 51; Axar Patel 2/19).
