Twitter announces new set of rules that will penalise abusive accounts

Twitter has announced a new set of guidelines to suspend users affiliated with hate groups on the platform. According to a report in Recode, the new rules will suspend accounts that will include "hateful imagery or display names"  or those who "use the username, display name, or profile bio to engage in abusive behavior."

It will also start removing specific tweets that glorify violence, suspend accounts that use their username or profile information to abuse or threaten others, and require users to take down any hateful imagery, including symbols, from the profile and background pictures.

Today, we are starting to enforce updates to the Twitter Rules and media policy to reduce hateful conduct and abusive behavior https://t.co/yNHAMFcVwG

— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) December 18, 2017

Recode noted that the new Twitter rules did not specifically mention the alt-right or neo-Nazi groups. The policy pointed more widely, toward "specific threats of violence or wish for the serious physical harm, death, or disease of an individual or group of people," the company's blog post said.

Some alt-right accounts have been suspended such as Jared Taylor and his site American Resistance, as well as White Nationalists Hunter Wallace and the Traditionalist Workers Party, British far-right group Britain First, and its founder Jayda Fransen. The social networking company said, "We're making these changes to make a safer environment for everyone."