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Bulletins

Twitter rolls out Safety Mode to autoblock toxic accounts

The company is launching the feature with "a small feedback group" of English language accounts.

Twitter HQ
Twitter HQ
Photo: Bloomberg

Twitter is rolling out a new feature called Safety Mode to a small group of English-speaking users. When users turn on the feature, Twitter will automatically block accounts for seven days based on "the likelihood of a negative engagement," the company said in a blog post Wednesday.

Twitter will assess whether an account should be blocked based on the content of its tweets and the existing relationship between the account holders. "Accounts you follow or frequently interact with will not be autoblocked," Twitter's senior product manager Jarrod Doherty wrote in the post.

Once autoblocked, an account will not be able to see a user's tweets or contact them via direct messages. "We want you to enjoy healthy conversations, so this test is one way we're limiting overwhelming and unwelcome interactions that can interrupt those conversations," Doherty wrote.

Issie Lapowsky

Issie Lapowsky ( @issielapowsky) is Protocol's chief correspondent, covering the intersection of technology, politics, and national affairs. She also oversees Protocol's fellowship program. Previously, she was a senior writer at Wired, where she covered the 2016 election and the Facebook beat in its aftermath. Prior to that, Issie worked as a staff writer for Inc. magazine, writing about small business and entrepreneurship. She has also worked as an on-air contributor for CBS News and taught a graduate-level course at New York University's Center for Publishing on how tech giants have affected publishing.

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