Twitter is no longer enforcing its policy about COVID-19 misinformation as part of changes made under new CEO Elon Musk.
Musk has already led Twitter into a contentious place in the social media world. He got rid of about half of its staff, including those involved in content moderation.
The move by Twitter has led to the risk of a potential surge in false claims even as COVID-19 cases rise in China and some parts of the world, according to Reuters.
“Effective November 23, 2022, Twitter is no longer enforcing the COVID-19 misleading information policy,” according to an update on its blog page. The update was first reported by CNN on Tuesday.
The platform suspended more than 11,000 accounts for violating the policy between January 2020 and September 2022, according to data published by Twitter.
Since spending $44 million on his acquisition of the social media company, Elon Musk has pledged to create a “free speech” platform, detailing a vision for having less content moderation measures in place, a move that critics say will create more hate speech and misinformation on the site reports The Hill.
Imran Ahmed, CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, called the rollback of the COVID-19 misinformation policy an “irresponsible decision” that puts lives at risk and “opens the floodgates to those who spread deadly lies.”
Early this year, Twitter said that since March 2021 it had stopped enforcing a “civic integrity policy” related to lies about the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
