‘Twitter Files’: A Tale of Censorship, Secret Blacklists, Shadow Banning and Government Collusion

 









 


 

Elon Musk credit: Samferdselsdepartementet/flickr

By  Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D.

A second batch of “Twitter files” released Thursday reveals how the platform maintained “secret blacklists” and engaged in “shadow banning.” Files released previously included evidence of election interference and widespread censorship of COVID-19-related information that didn’t fit the accepted government narrative.

The second batch of “Twitter files” released Thursday reveals how the platform maintained “secret blacklists” and engaged in “shadow banning” of certain users despite prior denials.

This latest in a string of stunning revelations and large-scale changes at Twitter following Elon Musk’s takeover adds to prior revelations about election interference — including suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story prior to the 2020 U.S. presidential election — and widespread scientific censorship.

The “blanket amnesty” of previously suspended accounts and Musk’s reinstatement over the past month of many such accounts — including former President Donald Trump’s — drew fury from many Democrat lawmakers and left-wing entities, but enjoyed wide swaths of support from Republicans and Libertarians.

The outcry from Democrats, and from entities including the EU and private Big Tech and Big Media actors such as Apple and CBS, has further complicated Musk’s plans for Twitter, amid investigations against Musk’s companies and threats from the EU that it will be banned in the 27-nation bloc.

‘Secret group’ at Twitter made ‘politically sensitive’ decisions

In a series of tweets Thursday, Bari Weiss, founder and editor of The Free Press, revealed information about the “secret blacklists” and other censorship practices Twitter engaged in.

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The Epoch Times reported that Weiss is working with Musk and independent journalist Matt Taibbi to disclose internal Twitter documents to the public, revealing the Big Tech platform’s practices prior to Musk’s takeover of the company.

Weiss revealed that among the user accounts previously targeted by Twitter was that of Dr. Jay Bhattacharaya, a Stanford University School of Medicine professor who criticized COVID-19 vaccines and countermeasures.

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This arsenal of practices enabled Twitter to make it difficult for other users to search for such accounts, to make individual tweets more difficult to find, to prevent tweets from appearing in Twitter’s “trending” section and to block tweets from appearing in hashtag searches, “all without users’ knowledge,” according to Weiss.

Many decisions were made, according to Weiss, by a “secret group,” the Strategic Response Team-Global Escalation Team (SRT-GET), that consisted of former Twitter executives including Vijaya Gadde, head of legal, public policy and trust; Yoel Roth, head of trust and safety; and CEOs Jack Dorsey and Parag Agrawal.

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Twitter took ‘extraordinary steps’ to suppress information about Hunter Biden 

The Gateway Pundit — part of a group of individuals and organizations suing several Biden administration officials over allegations they pressured social media platforms to censor content and individual users — on Dec. 2 republished a series of tweets by Taibbi revealing Twitter’s censorship of the Hunter Biden laptop story, and the apparent reasons behind this practice.

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Requests came from both parties and campaigns, Taibbi wrote, although he noted that “Because Twitter was and is overwhelmingly staffed by people of one political orientation, there were more channels, more ways to complain, open to the left (well, Democrats) than the right.”

On Oct. 14, 2020, when the New York Post published “Biden secret e-mails,” about the dealings of Hunter Biden, “Twitter took extraordinary steps to suppress the story, removing links and posting warnings that it may be ‘unsafe.’ They even blocked its transmission via direct message, a tool hitherto reserved for extreme cases, e.g. child pornography,” said Taibbi.

This decision led to the New York Post and then-White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany being locked out of their Twitter accounts — McEnany for a purported violation of Twitter’s “hacked materials” policy.

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Also playing a key role in the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, according to Taibbi, was James Baker, a former FBI lawyer who became Twitter’s deputy general counsel and who advised the company to continue censorship of the story because “caution is warranted.”

On Dec. 6, Musk announced that Twitter fired Baker, stating, “In light of concerns about Baker’s possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today.”

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After widespread censorship of scientific debate, new calls to add more voices

Twitter’s censorship practices targeting outspoken critics of official COVID-19 policies highlight broader practices that were the norm at Twitter prior to Musk taking control of the company.

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And on Dec. 5, Dr. Simone Gold, another outspoken critic of COVID-19 vaccines and restrictions, tweeted an open letter to Musk on behalf of America’s Frontline Doctors, calling upon Musk to assemble a team of “honest, brilliant, courageous doctors to ‘fact check’” medical information on the platform.

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White House, Congress, EU and others hit back at Musk and Twitter

Musk’s actions over the past several weeks have led to significant pushback, including from the Biden administration and the White House, members of Congress, local authorities in San Francisco — where Twitter is headquartered — the EU and various major corporate entities.

On Dec. 5, Reuters reported that Neuralink, a company owned by Musk, was under federal investigation in the U.S. “for potential animal-welfare violations amid internal staff complaints that its animal testing is being rushed, causing needless suffering and deaths.”

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As previously reported by The Defender, the Biden administration in 2021 threatened Big Tech platforms, including Twitter, with antitrust proceedings over their enormous market share if those companies did not provide, per the White House’s demand, content related to “health misinformation” on their platforms.

The Biden administration’s attempts to censor alleged “misinformation” are part of the basis for a lawsuit filed by the attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri.

On Dec. 8, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Cal.) tweeted:

“On Elon Musk’s Twitter: slurs against Black people have tripled, slurs against women are up 33%, slurs against Jewish people are up 61%, and slurs against gay men are up 58%.

“These numbers are abysmal — and unacceptable. Today, @RepMarkTakano and I are demanding action.”

Schiff did not provide a source for the data he cited. Musk, in response, cited statistics of his own, tweeting: “False, hate speech impressions are actually down by 1/3 for Twitter now vs prior to acquisition.”

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Local authorities in San Francisco, where Twitter is based, are also investigating Musk, alleging he has turned offices into bedrooms at the company’s headquarters.

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In response, Musk tweeted the following on Dec. 6: “So city of SF attacks companies providing beds for tired employees instead of making sure kids are safe from fentanyl. Where are your priorities[?],” tagging San Francisco mayor London Breed in the tweet.

The EU also set its sights on Twitter and Musk. According to a Nov. 30 Financial Times report, the EU, representing a bloc of 27 European nations, threatened to impose a ban on Twitter if its demands for an audit and for the non-reinstatement of banned accounts and rollback of loosening content moderation policies are not met.

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The DSA also requires platforms to “flag hate speech, eliminate any kind of terrorist propaganda” and implement “frameworks to quickly take down illicit content.”

Companies violating the provisions of the DSA would risk fines of up to 6% of their total global annual revenue, while repeat offenses may result in the platforms being banned from the EU — despite the “open internet” principle professed by the principle of “net neutrality” enshrined in EU law.

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In a move possibly connected to the EU’s threats, Musk closed Twitter’s offices in Brussels — where many EU institutions are headquartered — in late November, in an action framed by Euronews as one which is “raising fears Elon Musk may not comply with EU rules.”

Twitter and Musk also appear to have run into a potential confrontation with Apple — whose App Store makes Twitter’s mobile app widely available to users of Apple’s devices worldwide.

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Big Media has also gotten into the act. On Nov. 18, CBS ceased advertising on Twitter “out of an abundance of caution.” However, the boycott lasted for only two days, as two days later, CBS resumed advertising on Twitter.

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Republicans, Libertarians applaud Twitter revelations

In a Dec. 6 article, former presidential candidate and member of the House of Representatives Ron Paul said the release of the internal Twitter documents “blew the lid off government manipulation of social media.”

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House Republicans, who secured a majority in November’s elections, have hinted at a potential investigation or other legal action in relation to the Twitter revelations.

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Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/twitter-files-censorship-government-collusion/