Twitter's biggest anti-troll effort to date is finally here

Twitter is finally doing something about its troll problem.

Twitter announced on Tuesday new features and policy changes as part of a company-wide reset to address safety on the network, introducing a "mute" feature that looks to help users control what they see.

The updates attempt to combat abuse on Twitter, a problem that reached a crescendo during the election season. The issue of abuse on Twitter had built up over years, with a growing body of data showing the severity of the problem.

The issue had pushed some users to abandon the platform, while its business may have also suffered. Bloomberg reported that hateful communication reportedly contributed to Walt Disney's decision to forgo a bid to buy the company.

Twitter has admitted its inaction and need to change.

"Because Twitter happens in public and in real-time, we've had some challenges keeping up with and curbing abusive conduct. We took a step back to reset and take a new approach, find and focus on the most critical needs, and rapidly improve," the company said in a statement.

While Twitter has introduced several changes over the last two years (flagging abusive tweets, creating a safety council, introducing a quality filter), this announcement included new tools that had been sought for by users. Those will be matched by a renewed effort from the company to ramp up enforcement of its terms against abuse.

The mute function

First, an expanded mute function, which first appeared last month, will allow Twitter users to prevent keywords, phrases and conversations from appearing in their notifications. Users can access "muted words" under "Settings" in the notifications tab and add hashtags, usernames, emoji and words to a list.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

It's not a foolproof safeguard against seeing hateful words, or television spoilers, on Twitter. New tweets with the selected words will not appear in users' notification tabs on desktop or mobile, as push notifications and in email notifications, but users could still see them in their timelines. That could change in a future update.

Another way to further prevent seeing abuse in notifications is to limit notifications to the accounts you choose to follow, which Twitter introduced to the platform in August.

Users can mute conversations by selecting the arrow next to a tweet and choosing "Mute this conversation." It's also an easy way to escape from a Twitter canoe.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Twitter's role

Twitter said that as part of its goals to stop abuse, the company has improved its ways to report abuse and is also working on how it responds to these reports.

For the Twitter user, anyone can report a tweet as "abusive or harmful" and can now select from a handful of options explaining why it is so. For enforcement, Twitter has created new internal tools and has retrained its support teams through a new "rigorous" program, the company said.

Twitter declined to elaborate on or provide training material, but a source familiar with the program said that some sessions included analysis of specific groups that have faced prejudice and persecution. It also was not just a one-day program. Rather, the training included presentations and workshops and includes an ongoing refresher program.

Changes are far from over. "We don't expect these announcements to suddenly remove abusive conduct from Twitter," the company said. "No single action by us would do that. Instead we commit to rapidly improving Twitter based on everything we observe and learn."

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey defined the changes as "meaningful updates" during its quarterly earnings report last month. While they are steps in the right direction, we'll have to wait and see how these updates impact bullying.