Elon Musk’s X, the corporate previously referred to as Twitter, is planning to construct a brand new “Trust and Safety center of excellence” in Austin, Texas, to assist implement its content material and security guidelines.
The corporate goals to rent 100 full-time content material moderators on the new location, in line with Joe Benarroch, head of enterprise operations at X. The group will give attention to preventing materials associated to baby sexual exploitation, however will assist implement the social media platform’s different guidelines, which embody restrictions on hate speech and violent posts, he added. The corporate didn’t specify when this new heart might be operational.
“X does not have a line of business focused on children, but it’s important that we make these investments to keep stopping offenders from using our platform for any distribution or engagement with CSE content,” Benarroch stated. Individuals should be no less than 13-years-old to open an account on X, and the corporate says lower than 1% of its every day customers are between the ages of 13-17. These 17 and beneath can’t be focused by advertisers.
Musk has been criticized for chopping again on X’s belief and security operations since taking the helm of the corporate in October 2022. He has additionally rescinded some insurance policies, together with these round misinformation, in an effort to convey “free speech” again to the service.
The timing of X’s announcement comes just some days earlier than Chief Govt Officer Linda Yaccarino is scheduled to seem earlier than the Senate Judiciary Committee for a hearing on child safety online. She’ll be joined by the CEOs of different main expertise corporations, together with Meta Platforms Inc., Snap Inc., TikTok, and Discord.
Yaccarino was in Washington this previous week talking with senators from either side of the aisle forward of the upcoming listening to. Conversations centered on X’s efforts with CSE and different varieties of problematic content material, however she additionally tried to focus on the ways in which X is working to differentiate itself from Twitter and the corporate’s prior insurance policies and management, Benarroch added.
