Twitter Updates Its Reporting Feature To Better Protect User Information

Twitter is changing the process for reporting tweets which share private information, the change would provide options for specifying what sort of content evades their privacy.

On Thursday, the company announced this change through its Twitter Safety account by posting a GIF to guide users through each step of reporting a privacy-violating tweet. Now, users can choose which information is exposed, ID numbers, government-issued ID, financial information, or home address.

According to Twitter, the new feature will help make it faster in reviewing Tweets reported for sharing personal data.

In the past few years, the social network has come under criticism for lack of efforts to tackle the harassment problem on its platform. With the new personal info feature, the company enhances a set of tools introduced back in 2014 to fight abusive and vitriolic messages sent among users.

The update provides more specific options

This announcement of this update comes just one day after Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO and co-founder, unveiled a framework of plans which the company may use to develop a more “privacy-focused platform.” The plans said to encrypt messages, ensure user posts and messages are not stored for a longer time than needed, and let people communicate across Facebook-owned platforms.

Since the Cambridge Analytica data breach last year that affected millions of users, social media firms have been pushed to do more to protect user private information. In total, up to 87 million people were stolen of data without their consent. Although Facebook had to take the most responsibility in this scandal, the public and critics also look close to other social networks.