Twitter mistakenly filtered the accounts of Chinese activists following layoffs in Asia, report says

Elon Musk, and anti-censorship protestors in Beijing, China.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images; Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

• Over 30 prominent human rights activists in China saw their accounts hidden from search, per the NYT.
• Twitter's automated filter for spam and misinformation mistakenly restricted the activists, the Times said.
• Twitter's staff has been cut by around two-thirds since Elon Musk took over last October.

Twitter mistakenly filtered the accounts of a number of Chinese human rights activists after the company's Asia office saw its workforce reduced amid global staff cuts, The New York Times reported.

Over 30 prominent Chinese dissidents and activists' accounts weren't immediately visible when searching for them, the Times said, citing interviews and screenshots, as well as data from Shadow Bird, a site which analyzes whether accounts are subject to search blocks.

Three activists, who were not named, told the newspaper they were suspended without warning and only reinstated after appealing.

The activists include the likes of Bao Pu, an activist who gained followers by tweeting videos of protests against China's zero-COVID protocol, the Times said. An account in Bao's name has around 30,000 followers as of Wednesday, Insider found.

Twitter is banned in China, but it has become a hotspot for activists and dissidents in the country. In December, China announced a number of policy changes as it rolled back its controversial zero-COVID restrictions, which had sparked protests across the country.

President Xi Jinping introduced the policy meant not only to contain the virus, but completely eradicate it — resulting in strict lockdowns where some people were sealed indoors for prolonged periods.

While activists took to Elon Musk's platform to speak out against such lockdowns, it now appears many of them were shadowbanned. This involves making accounts harder to find and limiting the reach of their posts.

So-called shadowbans have been a prominent topic since Musk's takeover. He investigated some apparent shadowbans on his first day in charge, after a number of conservative figures urged him to overturn restrictions on their accounts put in place under Twitter's previous management.

In the "Twitter Files" — a series of reports about the platform's previous workings unveiled by independent journalists given special access to internal documents — shadowbanning was also a hot topic of debate.

Twitter's automated system intended to filter out spam and disinformation campaigns from governments mistakenly restricted the Chinese activists as well, four people with knowledge of the system told the Times.

Musk has introduced dramatic cost-cutting measures since taking over Twitter, with staff numbers slashed by more than two-thirds from over 7,000 to around 2,300.

In January, Insider's Kali Hays reported that its Asian headquarters in Singapore had been briefly closed down due to nonpayment of rent, before Musk ultimately made a late payment.

The Times reports that staff numbers on a team which previously dealt with mistakes relating to Twitter's filtering have fallen from around 50 to less than ten since Musk's takeover. The Times also reports that Twitter's top staffer in the Asia-Pacific region, who had oversight of handling Chinese activist accounts, was laid-off early this year.

Offices in Hong Kong and the Philippines are being closed, with plans to shut the South Korea office too, Insider previously reported. 

Twitter did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

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