#SaferInternetDay 2020: Creating a better internet for all

The first Safer Internet Day was held in 2004 — 2 years before Twitter was born. Now, 16 years on, we are delighted to be working with partners all over the world to mark #SaferInternetDay2020 and play our part in shaping a better internet for all.

Over the past 12 months, we have made substantial strides in tackling abusive content on our service globally. There will always be more to do, but we have made meaningful progress. Key highlights include:

• More than 1 in 2 of Tweets we take action on for abuse are now proactively surfaced using technology, rather than relying on reports to Twitter - this compares to 1 in 5 tweets in 2018;
• We have seen a 105% increase in accounts actioned by Twitter (locked or suspended for violating the Twitter Rules);
• In November 2019, we launched the option globally for users to hide replies to their Tweets — now anyone can choose to hide replies to their Tweets;
• In December 2019, we expanded and diversified our Trust and Safety Council, which brings together experts and organizations from around the world to help advise us as we develop our products, programs and the Twitter Rules;
• Last Tuesday, we announced a new rule to address synthetic & manipulated media. From 5 March, we will start labeling Tweets if we believe that media shared within them have been significantly and deceptively altered or fabricated. Labels will link to a Twitter moment to provide additional context from reputable sources on the content in question.

Making Twitter safer is not a job we can do alone — which is why it’s so important to us, to participate in #SaferInternetDay2020. Across the world today and throughout February, we are working with our network of safety partners to amplify their guidance, provide Ads for Good grants to support their campaigns, and collaborating on what we can all do create a better Internet. We are running safety training and delivering presentations on our work across 4 continents, and participating in events globally to commemorate the day.

In Mexico City, we will be delivering a safety training for the Mechanism for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and Journalists. In India, we will be addressing e-Raksha: Cybercrime Against Children with the CyberPeace Foundation & UNICEF.

At our HQ in San Francisco, we will be conducting a safety workshop for high school students from #ICANHELP (@icanhelp), and partnering with Common Sense (@commonsense) to deliver digital citizenship training to various nonprofits serving youth and families. We will also be opening our event space to 50 Digital Learning facilitators from San Francisco Unified School District (@SFUSDdot), and sharing Twitter educator and safety best practices. 

Here in Europe, we will be running a training at the Helsinki Central Library Oodi; participating in Better Internet for Kids meeting organised by the European Commission in Brussels, and running an event to promote a safer internet for all citizens, especially young people, with our partners Webwise at our international HQ in Dublin.

In the UK - working with @ArtHouse, we created four short videos about the range of safety tools available on Twitter, with 4 online leaders; Habiba da Silva, Dina Tokio, Hannah Witton, Alexander Leon. Our aim is to reach a wider audience with engaging content about these individuals’ own experiences on the service, and the safety tools they use. 

We are encouraging conversations with a special emoji for the hashtags #SaferInternetDay and #SID2020, available in eighteen languages to encourage conversations around a safer internet.

Throughout 2020, we will continue to support our safety partners, and work to ensure the public conversation on Twitter is healthy, open, and safe.