Saturday, October 31, 2020

Twitter Unlocks NY Post Account


Twitter backed down Friday in its battle with The NY Post and unlocked its main account after a two-week stalemate over the Hunter Biden exposé.

The move came after The Post refused Twitter’s demand that it delete six tweets that linked to stories that the company claimed — without any evidence — were based on hacked information.

In a series of tweets, the social-media giant said it was revising its “Hacked Materials Policy” and “updating our practice of not retroactively overturning prior enforcement.”

“Our policies are living documents,” said one of the tweets from @TwitterSafety.

“We’re willing to update and adjust them when we encounter new scenarios or receive important feedback from the public.”

The Post immediately celebrated the victory with a tweet declaring “We’re baaaaaaack” and an image of the tabloid’s Saturday front page, with the headline “FREE BIRD!”

Twitter arbitrarily cracked down on The Post and locked its account on Oct. 14.

The company claimed The Post violated a policy on sharing “hacked materials” by tweeting links to bombshell exclusives on Biden’s emails — without ever saying how it came to that conclusion and despite the fact that neither Hunter Biden or anyone else has claimed his emails were hacked.

The move sparked widespread outrage that led Twitter to revise its policy so other users could tweet the stories.

But it continued to hold The Post’s account hostage — demanding the six tweets about its own reporting be deleted. They never were.

On Friday, the company said that under its latest policy revision, “Decisions made under policies that are subsequently changed & published can now be appealed if the account at issue is a driver of that change.”

“We believe this is fair and appropriate,” Twitter said.

News Corp called the move, “an important moment for journalism and for the freedom of the press.”

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