Category Archives: Twitter

From Ed Balls to BTS: the greatest hits in Twitter’s history

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To mark the site’s takeover by the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, we present a survey of its most media-friendly moments

Twitter has great influence for a social media platform. It has a comparatively modest 230 million users, given that the likes of Instagram, Facebook and TikTok have user bases that run into the billions. But Twitter is beloved of politicians, celebrities, commentators and journalists and can have a great impact on the political and news cycle as a result. Here are some of the best-known and notorious tweets in the company’s 16-year history.

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Elon Musk declares Twitter ‘moderation council’ – as some push the platform’s limits

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Conservative users began recirculating conspiracy theories as others voiced concerns over allowing hate speech and disinformation

Among the most urgent questions facing Twitter in its new era as a private company under Elon Musk, a self-declared “free speech absolutist”, is how the platform will handle moderation.

After finalizing his takeover and ousting senior leadership, Musk declared on Friday that he would be forming a new “content moderation council” that would bring together “diverse views” on the issue.

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Twitter takeover: fears raised over disinformation and hate speech

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EU commissioner says Elon Musk’s platform must ‘fly by our rules’ as UK minister raises concerns over content moderation

Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition has been polarizing, sparking reactions from politicians, regulators and non-profits across different continents.

Some have expressed concerns about potential changes to Twitter’s content moderation policies now that it’s in the hands of the Tesla billionaire, while others celebrated how they expect the platform’s newly minted leader will handle content and speech on Twitter.

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Elon Musk makes splashy visit to Twitter headquarters carrying sink

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Tesla CEO changes his profile to ‘Chief Twit’ as Friday deadline to finalize his takeover deal nears

Elon Musk paid a visit to Twitter’s headquarters ahead of an end-of-week deadline to close his deal to buy the company, posting a video of himself in the company’s San Francisco lobby carrying a sink.

“Entering Twitter HQ - let that sink in!” he tweeted on Wednesday.

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Kanye West’s Instagram and Twitter accounts locked over antisemitic posts

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The rapper has also drawn heavy criticism for donning a ‘white lives matter’ T-shirt during Paris fashion week

Kanye West has now had both his Instagram and Twitter accounts locked after antisemitic posts over the weekend.

Twitter locked his account Sunday after it removed one of West’s tweets saying he was going “death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE” because it violated the service’s policies against hate speech.

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Banks stand to lose at least $500m if they fund Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover

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Morgan Stanley and six others committed in April to raise $13bn in debt to finance the purchase – before a deterioration in credit markets

Several large US and international banks would lose $500m or more if they proceed with obligations to fund Elon Musk’s $44bn takeover of Twitter, according to a report on Saturday.

The banks, led by Morgan Stanley and six others, including Barclays and Bank of America, committed six months ago to raise $13bn in debt to finance Musk’s purchase – an agreement that does not hinge on whether they are able to sell the debt on to investors.

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Zelenskiy hits back as Elon Musk sets up Twitter poll on annexed areas of Ukraine

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Outrage and condemnation over billionaire’s suggestions including formally making Crimea part of Russia

Elon Musk has prompted an online row with Ukraine’s president after he asked Twitter users to weigh in on his ideas to end Russia’s war.

In a tweet, Musk suggested UN-supervised elections in four occupied regions that Moscow has falsely annexed after what it called referendums. The votes were denounced by Kyiv and western governments as illegal and coercive. “Russia leaves if that is will of the people,” Musk wrote.

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Elon Musk deposition in Twitter fight rescheduled for first week of October

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Musk to be questioned under oath by Twitter lawyers on 6 and 7 October in preparation for trial over abandoned $44bn takeover

Elon Musk is scheduled to be questioned under oath by Twitter lawyers next month as the social media company prepares for a trial over the billionaire’s bid to walk away from a $44bn takeover, according to a Tuesday court filing.

Musk’s deposition was originally scheduled for this week but sources close to the litigation said on Monday that the timing of the interview was always subject to change given the fast-tracked nature of the litigation. He is scheduled to be questioned on 6 and 7 October.

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Elon Musk to face deposition by Twitter lawyers ahead of trial

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Attorneys are expected to use the interview to try to show that Musk abandoned the deal due to falling financial markets

Elon Musk is scheduled to spend the next few days with lawyers for Twitter, answering questions ahead of an October trial that will determine whether he must follow through on his $44bn agreement to acquire the social platform after attempting to back out of the deal.

The deposition, planned for Monday, Tuesday and a possible extension on Wednesday, will not be public. As of Sunday evening, it was not clear whether Musk would appear in person or by video. Reuters reported the deposition did not happen Monday nor was a reason given for the delay, citing sources with knowledge of the situation.

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Dutch town takes Twitter to court over unfounded satanic paedophile claims

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Bodegraven-Reeuwijk has been plagued by a conspiracy theory and wants tweets spreading it removed

A small Dutch town took Twitter to court on Friday to demand the social media company take down all messages relating to a supposed ring of Satan-worshipping paedophiles alleged to have been active in the town in the 1980s.

Bodegraven-Reeuwijk, a town of about 35,000 inhabitants in the middle of the Netherlands, has been the focus of conspiracy theories on social media since 2020, when three men started spreading unfounded stories about the abuse and murder of children they said took place in the town in the 1980s.

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Twitter whistleblower tells Senate of ‘egregious’ security failings by company

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Peiter ‘Mudge’ Zatko, former head of security, says ‘any employee could take over the accounts of any senator in this room’

A Twitter whistleblower who accused the company of “egregious” security deficiencies testified in front of Congress on Tuesday, expanding on accusations of corporate failings he filed to federal agencies in August.

Former hacker Peiter “Mudge” Zatko worked as head of security at Twitter from 2020 until he was fired in 2022, and says in that time he witnessed “extreme, egregious deficiencies by Twitter in every area of his mandate”.

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Queen’s death intensifies criticism of British empire’s violent atrocities

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American commentators, academics and others are calling into reconsideration of monarchy’s lasting influences

The death of Queen Elizabeth II revived longstanding criticism in the US over the monarchy’s enrichment from the British empire’s violent colonization of African, Asian and Caribbean nations and their diasporas.

Since her death on Thursday, American commentators, academics, and a former US diplomat, among others, took to social media and elsewhere to call for fully wrestling with the British monarchy’s lasting influence in light of the monarch’s death.

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Hateful tweets multiply in extreme temperatures, US analysis finds

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Scientists logged rises of up to 22% in racist and misogynist tweets when temperatures rose above 42C

Hateful tweets multiply dramatically as temperatures become more extreme, an analysis of 4bn geo-located tweets in the US has found.

Scientists logged rises of up to 22% in racist, misogynist and homophobic tweets when temperatures rose above 42C, and increases of up to 12% when the mercury fell below -3C, according to a study by The Lancet Planetary Health.

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Elon Musk demands Twitter trial delay over whistleblower concerns

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Twitter counters that Musk is using new claims to cover up buyer’s remorse as trial over broken deal set to begin next month

A trial over Elon Musk’s bid to end his $44bn deal for Twitter should be delayed by several weeks to allow him to investigate a whistleblower’s claims about security on the social media platform, Musk’s lawyer told a judge on Tuesday.

“Doesn’t justice demand a few weeks to look into this?” said Musk’s lawyer, Alex Spiro, at a hearing in Wilmington, Delaware.

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Saudi woman jailed for 45 years over social media use, says group

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Nourah bint Saeed al-Qahtani accused of ‘using the internet to tear Saudi Arabia’s social fabric’

Another Saudi Arabian woman has been sentenced to decades in prison by the kingdom’s terrorism court for using social media to “violate the public order”, according to court documents seen by a human rights group.

Nourah bint Saeed al-Qahtani was sentenced to 45 years in prison after a specialised criminal court convicted her of “using the internet to tear [Saudi Arabia’s] social fabric”, according to documents that were obtained and reviewed by Democracy for the Arab World Now (Dawn), an organisation founded by Jamal Khashoggi.

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Judge orders Twitter to turn over to Elon Musk data from 2021 users audit

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The company had said the information did not exist, but it sampled 9,000 users in order to estimate the number of spam accounts

Elon Musk may get access to Twitter data used in a 2021 audit of active users but other information the billionaire seeks in a bid to end his $44bn deal to buy the company were rejected as “absurdly broad”, a judge said on Thursday.

Twitter must turn over data from the 9,000 accounts sampled in the fourth quarter as part of its process to estimate the number of spam accounts.

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Saudi woman jailed for Twitter use alleges abuse during detention

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Salma Al-Shehab alleged she had been ‘repeatedly accosted’ by at least five men for belonging to the kingdom’s Shia Muslim minority

Salma al-Shehab, the Saudi PhD student who was sentenced to 34 years in prison for using Twitter, told a Saudi court that she had faced abuse and harassment during her detention, including being subjected to interrogations after being given medications that exhausted her.

The 34-year-old, who was completing her PhD at Leeds University before her January 2021 arrest during a holiday at home, also alleged that she had been “repeatedly accosted” by at least five men for being a member of the kingdom’s Shia Muslim minority. Without providing more details, Shehab said the actions had led to an “outright insult and abuse of human dignity”.

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Saudi snitching app appears to have been used against jailed Leeds student

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‘Terrifying tool’ under scrutiny as Salma al-Shehab’s tweets suggest widely available phone app was used to report her

The Saudi woman who was sentenced to 34 years in prison for a tweet appears to have been denounced to Saudi authorities through a crime-reporting app that users in the kingdom can download to Apple and Android phones.

A review of Leeds PhD student Salma al-Shehab’s tweets and interactions shows she was messaged by a person using a Saudi account on 15 November, 2020 after she posted a mildly critical tweet in response to a Saudi government post about a new public transportation contract.

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Saudi woman given 34-year prison sentence for using Twitter

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Salma al-Shehab, a Leeds University student, was charged with following and retweeting dissidents and activists

A Saudi student at Leeds University who had returned home to the kingdom for a holiday has been sentenced to 34 years in prison for having a Twitter account and for following and retweeting dissidents and activists.

The sentencing by Saudi’s special terrorist court was handed down weeks after the US president Joe Biden’s visit to Saudi Arabia, which human rights activists had warned could embolden the kingdom to escalate its crackdown on dissidents and other pro-democracy activists.

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Ex-Twitter employee found guilty of spying on Saudi dissidents

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Ahmad Abouammo found to have given users’ personal information to Mohammed bin Salman’s aide

A former Twitter employee has been found guilty of spying on Saudi dissidents using the social media platform and passing their personal information to a close aide of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

A jury in a federal court in California found Ahmad Abouammo, a dual US-Lebanese national, had acted as an unregistered agent of the Saudi government.

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