Biodun.BBC: Tommy Robinson

Thursday, March 29, 2018

Tommy Robinson Twitter account — Image captionTwitter does not intend to let Mr Robinson return to its platform

by Tamara Kachelmeier and Biodun Iginla, BBC News Technology reporters, London

Tommy Robinson - ex-leader of the English Defence League - has been banned from Twitter.

His account is marked as being "suspended", but the BBC has learned that the US company has decided to permanently revoke his access.

Twitter declined to comment, but it is understood the decision was taken after Mr Robinson was judged to have breached its "hateful conduct" policy.

It had previously temporarily suspended the activist several times.

Mr Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, left the EDL in 2013.

Most recently, Twitter had blocked his account for a week at the start of March.

He said at the time that the reason was that he had posted that "90% of grooming gang convictions are Muslims".

The social network had removed his blue verification tick four months earlier.

Mr Robinson's @TRobinsonNewEra account had about 413,000 followers at the time it was blocked.

In addition, Twitter has acted against another account - @tommysnewspage - which had also been associated with the 35-year-old.

Mr Robinson continues to operate a Facebook page, a YouTube account and a personal website.

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Thursday, November 16, 2017

Far-right accounts lose Twitter verified tick

Image captionRichard Spencer and Tommy Robinson have lost their blue badges

by Tamara Kachelmeier and Biodun Iginla, BBC News Technology reporters, San Francisco. Discolsure: Tamara Kachelmeier and Biodun Iginla had a romantic relationship when both of them were based in Minneapolis.

Twitter has stripped several far-right accounts of their "verified" badge, after changing its policy.

Among them are Jason Kessler who helped organise a far-right march in Charlottesville, and white supremacist Richard Spencer.

English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson also had his badge removed.

Twitter said the badge was being interpreted as an "endorsement or an indicator of importance" and said it would change the scheme.

'Promotes hate'

The blue badge was first introduced to indicate the authenticity of prominent profiles on the social network.

Originally the site had chosen who to verify, and usually reserved the status for celebrities, public officials and journalists.

In July 2016, it opened the scheme up to the wider public and let anybody apply for a verified badge.

Last week, the social network was criticised for giving Mr Kessler a verified badge, and on 9 November halted its verified profile scheme.

It said it had not intended the blue badge to be an endorsement of views shared.

"We gave verified accounts visual prominence on the service which deepened this perception," it said. "We should have addressed this earlier but did not prioritise the work as we should have."

Twitter said it was designing a new "authentication and verification programme", but in the meantime would "remove verification from accounts whose behaviour does not fall within the new guidelines".

The new guidelines say verified status can be lost if a person breaks Twitter's rules or "promotes hate" on the basis of "race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or disease".

It said behaviour both on and off Twitter would be taken into account.

Some of those who had their verified badges removed said the new policy was being applied inconsistently and highlighted accounts of disgraced celebrities that had not lost the icon.

Mr Kessler suggested Twitter had changed its rules to "censor" his views, while Mr Robinson said Twitter now classed the truth as "hate speech".

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Biodun.BBC

Biodun Iginla, BBC News

Thursday, March 29, 2018

Tommy Robinson banned from Twitter

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