Headline Roundup • December 26th, 2022
New 'Twitter Files' Highlight Platform's Moderation of Information on COVID-19
Summary from the AllSides News Team
The latest "Twitter Files," published by journalist David Zweig, moves to detail Twitter's approach to censoring certain information and viewpoints, particularly about COVID-19.
The Details: Through apparent screenshots of internal Twitter communications, the release seems to indicate that both the Biden and Trump administrations pressured Twitter to censor certain information. Specifically, screenshots appear to show how former FBI and Twitter lawyer Jim Baker moved to have a tweet from President Donald Trump telling Americans “Don’t be afraid of Covid” labeled as misinformation; how the Trump administration urged Twitter to "combat misinformation" about "runs on grocery stores"; and how "the Biden team" pushed for action against people who voiced skepticism about COVID-19 vaccines for young people, including epidemiologist Martin Kuldorff and journalist Alex Berenson.
For Context: This is the tenth installment of the Twitter Files, an effort by Twitter CEO Elon Musk to publish internal conversations about Twitter's controversial content moderation decisions.
How the Media Covered It: The latest "Twitter Files" was a top story from right-rated sources, which continue to frame it as damning evidence of a conspiracy by the government, media companies and tech companies to suppress conservative or dissenting viewpoints. No left- or center-rated sources covered the story as of Monday evening, and very few have covered the Twitter Files at all.
Key Quotes: Zweig said the release showed how Twitter "seemed to promote content that reinforced the establishment narrative, and to suppress views and even scientific evidence that ran to the contrary."
Featured Coverage of this Story
Johannes Eisele via Getty Images
I had always thought a primary job of the press was to be skeptical of power—especially the power of the government. But during the Covid-19 pandemic, I and so many others found that the legacy media had shown itself to largely operate as a messaging platform for our public health institutions. Those institutions operated in near total lockstep, in part by purging internal dissidents and discrediting outside experts.
Twitter became an essential alternative. It was a place where those with public health expertise and perspectives at odds with official policy could air their...
AP
Twitter relied on bots, foreign contractors and busybody users dubbed “tattles” to enforce its misinformation policies, the latest report on the company’s internal practices revealed Monday.
In a case study, the Free Press reporter David Zweig focused on an Aug. 11 tweet from user @KelleyKga, who describes herself in her Twitter biography as an “‘Internet rando’ and public health fact checker — Focused on Covid and kids, restoring normalcy, and Covid metrics in Georgia.”
On that day, Kelley took issue with another user who claimed COVID-19 had been the “leading cause of death from...
Mike Segar/Reuters
During the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, Twitter’s leaders bowed to government pressure to censor information that was true but inconvenient, suspended medical professionals who disagreed with establishment views, and relied on bots and foreign contractors to moderate complex scientific topics, according to the newest edition of the Twitter Files.
Independent journalist David Zweig released the 40-tweet Twitter Files report — “How Twitter Rigged the Covid Debate” — on Monday. The report is based on internal Twitter files that Zweig reviewed for the Free Press. The Twitter Files is a series of reports...
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