Twitter said Friday that it will apply new labels identifying misleading from political candidates and campaign accounts to limit the spread of voting misinformation.
The social media platform’s new features are meant to flag posts from politicians who prematurely claim victory, NBC reported. The labels will be placed on false information put out by politicians or U.S. accounts with more than 100,000 followers according to a statement from Twitter.
“People on Twitter, including candidates for office, may not claim an election win before it is authoritatively called,” Twitter’s statement said. “To determine the results of an election in the US, we require either an announcement from state election officials, or a public projection from at least two authoritative, national news outlets that make independent election calls.”
NEW: Twitter announces changes it asserts will make it more difficult to view misleading information about voting. https://t.co/dVYbz495eW
— NBC News (@NBCNews) October 9, 2020
Twitter also said it could remove Tweets meant to impede the electoral process or lead to violent actions.
“Tweets meant to incite interference with the election process or with the implementation of election results, such as through violent action, will be subject to removal. This covers all Congressional races and the Presidential Election,” the statement said.
The news comes as other social media platforms announce their own strategies to fight misleading claims, NBC reported. Earlier this week, Facebook banned conspiracy theorist QAnon pages across all of its platforms and said Sept. 3 that it will ban all political issue ads a week before the Nov. 3 election. Additionally, Facebook said it will halt all political ads after the polls close on election night.(RELATED: Facebook To Ban All QAnon Accounts)
“It’s important that campaigns can run get out the vote campaigns, and I generally believe the best antidote to bad speech is more speech, but in the final days of an election there may not be enough time to contest new claims,” Zuckerberg said in a statement. (RELATED: Facebook Will Ban New Political Ads 1 Week Before The Election To Curb Misinformation)
Google announced Sept. 25 that it will bar political advertisements on YouTube while votes are counted after the Nov. 3 presidential election, but did not say long the ban would last.