Get Verified and Twitter May Respond to Your Harassment Message
Everyone knows Twitter is terrible at dealing with harassment , but the Daily Beast recently explained why , citing anonymous former employees who blame understaffed support teams for lack of training and a comprehensive response flowchart that doesn’t take into account common sense or individual judgment. They also showed that reports from verified users move to a second, shorter work queue.
If you can’t ask a friend on Twitter or go viral by embarrassing part-time CEO Jack Dorsey , checkout is your best chance to draw attention to your post. Starting last year, anyone can apply for confirmation on Twitter – you don’t even need to be a famous white supremacist . Twitter requirements listed include verifying your phone number and email address, completing your birthday profile, and enabling two-factor login security. (You may also want to switch from your Halloween name to your real name.) Then fill out this form . Now, instead of waiting for Twitter to ban the person who sent you death threats, you can wait for them to confirm you!
Buffer, a third-party social media tool, offers some tips for getting verified : Maintain an active account and customize your profile to look important and connected. In your bio, include any other verified accounts you are associated with. List your areas of expertise. Add specific details about yourself to show that you are real and to demonstrate how important you are. It’s ugly, but it’s a way of letting the poor Twitter employee know that if they ignore your request, it could turn out to be a scandal. (Don’t actually try to hint at it. Nothing screams “I am nobody” like screaming “Do you know who I am?”
Validation has other benefits as well, such as jumping to the top of the response chain and getting some Twitter features early. But ironically, by making you one of the “elite,” a check badge can make you a more attractive target for attackers.
And that doesn’t necessarily mean that Twitter support will take you seriously. When a Twitter attacker sent rape threats to engineer Kelly Ellis, she was unable to get Twitter to block or even suspend the account – even though she was verified and even though she worked for Medium, the company founded by Twitter’s creator. Twitter didn’t ban the stalker until Ellis screened dozens of their offensive posts and was covered by BuzzFeed .
Therefore, screening is not a reliable method of dealing with harassment. But in the hellish landscape of Twitter, this is the best option you have.
Want to remove Nazis from your Twitter feed? It helps to be a VIP. | Daily beast