Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's Senate hearing testimony in 18 minutes (supercut)

The Misinformation Epidemic: A Threat to American Democracy

For about a hundred years, foreign sources have been trying to influence U.S. policy in U.S. elections by spreading disinformation on social media platforms. This has become increasingly evident as foreign dictators and other nations seek to access the American people through these platforms.

Twitter, in particular, has been under scrutiny for its handling of foreign interference. In a recent hearing, CEO Jack Dorsey was asked about Twitter's role in spreading misinformation during the 2020 election. Dorsey refused to take responsibility for allowing false information to spread on his platform, instead claiming that it was not their company's policy to censor or ban foreign dictators.

However, critics argue that this approach is misleading and puts American democracy at risk. "We're focused on those three categories only," Dorsey said in response to criticism of Twitter's handling of foreign interference. This implies that Twitter is willing to allow certain types of disinformation to spread as long as it doesn't violate specific categories.

Dorsey also claimed that Twitter had not censored the president or taken down tweets containing false information about him. However, critics argue that this approach is hypocritical and ignores the fact that Twitter has a history of censoring conservative voices and taking down content that is critical of liberal politicians.

In reality, Twitter's moderation policies are designed to protect the conversation and integrity of the platform around elections. However, these policies have been criticized for being too broad and allowing for excessive censorship. "Our current moderation policies are to protect the conversation," Dorsey said in response to criticism. This approach is often referred to as "censorship" by critics.

One notable example of Twitter's handling of misinformation was during a recent hearing where Senator Ron Johnson claimed that he had been physically attacked by a neighbor and that the incident involved his four-year-old son and three-year-old daughter. The tweet was quickly retweeted thousands of times and viewed by millions, despite being completely fabricated.

Twitter responded to the senator's request to take down the tweet by saying that it would be escalated to their support team for review. However, this response has been criticized as inadequate, given the widespread dissemination of false information on the platform.

The lack of transparency and accountability from Twitter's moderation policies is a major concern. Critics argue that the company's approach is opaque and fails to provide adequate context or labeling on misleading content. "We don't know what we're seeing," said Dorsey in response to criticism of Twitter's handling of foreign interference. This lack of transparency makes it difficult for users to discern fact from fiction, contributing to a misinformed public discourse.

In conclusion, the spread of misinformation on social media platforms like Twitter poses a significant threat to American democracy. The company's approach to moderation and censorship is often opaque and fails to provide adequate context or labeling on misleading content. Until Twitter takes steps to increase transparency and accountability in its moderation policies, the platform will continue to be vulnerable to foreign interference and the spread of disinformation.

The Politics of Moderation

In a recent hearing, Mark Zuckerberg was asked about the politics of moderation at Facebook. Zuckerberg claimed that his company's approach to moderation is focused on protecting the conversation and integrity of the platform around elections. However, critics argue that this approach is often used as a pretext for censoring conservative voices and taking down content that is critical of liberal politicians.

"I don't know the makeup of our employees because it's not something we ask or focus on," said Dorsey in response to criticism of Twitter's handling of foreign interference. This claim is difficult to verify, given that companies like Facebook and Twitter often fail to disclose information about their employee demographics.

In reality, the politics of moderation at these companies can be quite polarized. Critics argue that conservative voices are often marginalized or censored on platforms like Facebook and Twitter, while liberal politicians and their allies receive preferential treatment.

"Would you say that the political ideology of the employees of your company is 50/50 conservative versus liberal progressive?" asked a moderator during the hearing. Dorsey's response was unclear, but it suggested that he may not have an accurate understanding of his own company's politics.

Twitter, in particular, has been accused of being biased against conservative voices. Critics argue that the platform's algorithmic ranking system favors liberal content and suppresses conservative perspectives. "We don't think we're censoring," said Dorsey in response to criticism of Twitter's handling of foreign interference. However, critics argue that this approach is often used as a pretext for suppressing conservative voices.

The Spread of Disinformation

In recent years, social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have been criticized for their role in spreading disinformation during elections. The spread of false information on these platforms has become increasingly evident, particularly in the wake of foreign interference.

During a recent hearing, CEO Mark Zuckerberg was asked about Facebook's role in spreading disinformation during the 2016 election. Zuckerberg claimed that the company had taken steps to mitigate the spread of false information on its platform. However, critics argue that these efforts were inadequate and failed to address the root causes of the problem.

"Facebook took steps to reduce the spread of misinformation," said Zuckerberg in response to criticism. This claim is difficult to verify, given that companies like Facebook often fail to disclose information about their efforts to combat disinformation.

In reality, social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have a history of failing to address the spread of false information during elections. Critics argue that these companies prioritize engagement metrics over fact-checking and verification processes, which can contribute to the spread of disinformation.

The Spread of Disinformation on Twitter

Twitter has been criticized for its role in spreading disinformation during elections. The platform's approach to moderation has been opaque and failed to provide adequate context or labeling on misleading content.

During a recent hearing, CEO Jack Dorsey was asked about Twitter's role in spreading misinformation during the 2020 election. Dorsey claimed that Twitter had not censored the president or taken down tweets containing false information about him. However, critics argue that this approach is hypocritical and ignores the fact that Twitter has a history of censoring conservative voices.

"Twitter's approach to moderation is often opaque and fails to provide adequate context or labeling on misleading content," said a moderator during the hearing. This lack of transparency makes it difficult for users to discern fact from fiction, contributing to a misinformed public discourse.

The Spread of Disinformation in the 2020 Election

During the 2020 election, social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter were criticized for their role in spreading disinformation. The spread of false information on these platforms contributed to widespread confusion and polarization among voters.

The Future of Social Media Moderation

As social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter continue to grapple with the issue of misinformation, it is clear that a more nuanced approach is needed. The company's approach to moderation should prioritize fact-checking and verification processes over engagement metrics, which can contribute to the spread of disinformation.

In addition, social media companies must take steps to increase transparency and accountability in their moderation policies. This includes providing users with accurate information about the content they are sharing, labeling misleading content, and taking steps to prevent the spread of false information.

Ultimately, the future of social media moderation will depend on the willingness of these companies to prioritize fact-checking and verification processes over engagement metrics and profit-driven goals. By taking a more nuanced approach to moderation, social media platforms can help to reduce the spread of misinformation and promote a more informed public discourse.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: ensome of you don't trust we're acting in good faith that's the problem i want to focus on solving how does services like twitter earn your trust thank you members of the commerce committee for the opportunity to speak with the american people about twitter and section 230. my remarks will be brief so we can get to questions section 230 is the most important law protecting internet speech and removing section 230 will remove speech from the internet section 230 gave internet services two important tools the first provides immunity from liability for users content the second provides good samaritan protections for content moderation and removal even of constitutionally protected speech as long as it's done in good faith that concept of good faith is what's being challenged by many of you today some of you don't trust we're acting in good faith that's the problem i want to focus on solving how do services like twitter earn your trust how do we ensure more choice in the market if we don't there are three solutions we'd like to propose to address the concerns raised all focused on services that decide to moderate or remove content it could be expansions to section 230 new legislative frameworks or commitment to industry-wide self-regulation best practices the first is requiring a services moderation process to be published our cases reported and reviewed our decisions made what tools are used to enforce publishing answers to questions like these will make our process more robust and accountable to the people we serve the second is requiring a straightforward process to appeal decisions made by humans or by algorithms this ensures people can let us know when we don't get it right so we can fix any mistakes and make our processes better in the future and finally much of the content people see today is determined by algorithms with very little visibility into how they choose what they show we took a first step in making this more transparent by building a button to turn off our home timeline algorithms it's a good start but we're inspired by the market approach suggested by dr stephen wolfram before this committee in june 2019 enabling people to choose algorithms created by third parties to rank and filter the content is an incredibly energizing idea that's in reach requiring one moderation process and practices to be published two a straightforward process to appeal decisions and three best efforts around algorithmic choice our suggestions to address the concerns we all have going forward and they're all achievable in short order it's critical as we consider these solutions we optimize for new startups and independent developers doing so ensures a level playing field that increases the probability of competing ideas to help solve problems we mustn't entrench the largest companies any further thank you for the time and i look forward to a productive discussion to dig into these and other ideas the three witnesses we have before this committee today collectively pose i believe the single greatest threat to free speech in america and the greatest threat we have to free and fair elections but today i want to focus my questioning on mr dorsey and on twitter because of the three players before us i think twitter's conduct has by far been the most egregious mr dorsey does twitter have the ability to influence elections no you don't believe twitter has any ability to influence elections no we are one part of a spectrum of communication challenges that people have so you're testifying to this committee right now that that twitter when it silences people when it censors people when it blocks political speech that has no impact on elections people people have choice of other communication channels with which not if they don't hear information if you don't think you have the power to influence elections why do you block anything uh well we have policies that are focused on making sure that more voices on the platform are possible we see a lot of abuse and harassment which ends up silencing people and helping them leave from the platform why did twitter make the decision to censor the new york post uh we had a hack materials policy um when was that policy adopted uh in 2018 i believe in 2018 go ahead what was what was the policy so the policy is around um limiting the spread of materials that are hacked we didn't want twitter to be a distributor for hack materials we found that the newer post because it showed the direct materials screenshots of the direct materials and it was unclear how those were attained that it felt that it fell under this policy now so in your view if it's unclear the source of a document in this instance the new york post documented what it said the source was which it said it was a a laptop owned by hunter biden that had been turned into a repair store so they weren't hiding what they claimed to be the source is it your position that twitter when you can't tell the source blocks blocks press stories no not at all um we our team made a fast decision uh the enforcement action however of blocking urls both in tweets and uh in dm in direct messages we believe was incorrect and we changed it today the new york post is still blocked from tweeting two weeks later yes they have to log into their account which they can do at this minute delete the original tweet which fell under our original enforcement actions and they can tweet the exact same material from the exact same article and it would go through so mr dorsey your ability is you have the power to force a media out and let's be clear the new york post isn't just some random guy tweeting the new york post has the fourth highest circulation of any newspaper in america the new york post is over 200 years old the new york post was founded by alexander hamilton and your position is that that you can sit in silicon valley and demand of the media that you can tell them what stories they can publish and you can tell the american people what reporting they can hear is that right no this was this was a you know every person every account uh every uh organization that signs up to twitter agrees to terms of service in terms of service so media lets us genuflect and obey your dictates if they wish to be able to communicate with readers is that right no not at all we you know we we recognized an error in this policy and specifically the enforcement did twitter block the distribution of the new york times story a few weeks ago that purported to be based on copies of president trump's tax returns we didn't find that a violation of our terms of service and this policy in particular because there's reporting about the material it wasn't distributing the material okay well that's actually not true that they posted what they purported to be original source materials and federal law federal statute makes it a crime a federal felony to distribute someone's tax returns against their knowledge so that material was based on something that was distributed in violation of federal law and yet twitter gleefully allowed people to circulate that but when the article was critical of joe biden twitter engaged in rampant uh censorship and silencing and again we recognized errors in that policy we we changed it within 24 hours this is this is what you're still watching the new york post you haven't changed it we have changed it they can log into their account delete the original tweet you forced the politico reporter to take down his post about the new york post as well is that correct within that 24-hour period yes but we you know as the policy has changed anyone can tweet something you can censor the new york post you expense or politico presumably you can censor the new york times or any other media outlet mr dorsey who the hell elected you and put you in charge of what the media are allowed to report and what the american people are allowed to hear and why do you persist in behaving as a democratic super pac silencing views to the contrary your political belief we're not doing that and this is why i opened this hearing with calls for more transparency we realize we need to earn trust more we realize that more accountability is needed to show our intentions and to show the outcomes thank you so i i hear the concerns and acknowledge them but we want to fix it with more transparency mr dorsey how does it claim by chinese communists that the u.s military is to blame for covid remain up for two months without a fact check and the president's tweet about security mail and ballots get labeled instantly as you mentioned we did label that tweet um as we think about enforcement we consider severity of offline of potential offline harm and we act as quickly as we can we have taken action against tweets from world leaders all around the world including the president and we did take action on that tweet because we saw it we saw the confusion it might encourage and we labeled it accordingly and the goal with the labeling you're speaking of the president's tweet yes okay the goal of our labeling is to provide more context to connect the dots uh so that people can have more information so they can make decisions for themselves we you know we we've created these policies recently we are enforcing them um there are certainly things that we can do much faster but generally we believe that the policy was enforced in a timely manner and uh in the right regard and and yet uh you seem to have no objection to um a tweet by the chinese communist party saying the u.s army brought the epidemic to wuhan well we did and we we labeled that tweet um providing providing too much to do so is that correct i'm not sure of the exact time frame but we can get back to you on that we believe it's important for everyone to hear from global leaders and we have policies around world leaders we want to make sure that um we are respecting um their right to speak uh and and to uh publish what they need but if there is a violation of our terms of service uh we want to label it mr dorsey do you believe that the holocaust really happened yes or no yes so you would agree that someone who says the holocaust may not have happened is spreading misinformation yes or no yes i appreciate your answers on this but they surprised me and probably a lot of other colorads and americans after all iran's ayatollah has done exactly this questioning the holocaust and yet his tweets remain unflagged on twitter's platform can you name any other instance of twitter hiding or deleting a tweet from heads of state uh not not off the top of my head but we have many examples across world leaders around the world would you be willing to provide a list of those absolutely it's strange to me that you've flagged the tweets from the president but haven't hidden the ayatollah's tweets on holocaust denial or calls to wipe israel off the map does twitter maintain a formal list of certain accounts that you actively monitor for misinformation no and we don't have a policy against misinformation we have a policy against misinformation in three categories which are manipulated media public health specifically covet and civic integrity election and election interference and voter suppression that is all we have policy on for misleading information we do not have policy or enforcement for any other types of misleading information that you're mentioning so somebody denying the murder of millions of people or instigating violence against a country as a head of state is not categorically falling in any of those three misinformation or other categories twitter has not misinformation but we do have other policies around incitement to violence uh which which may um some some of the tweets you mentioned are the examples that you're mentioning uh may fall fallow um but for misleading information uh we're focused on those three categories only for about a hundred years foreign sources have been trying to influence u.s policy in u.s elections now they're onto your platforms they see this as a way to get access to the american people so given your refusal to censor or ban foreign dictators while regularly censoring the president aren't you at this very moment personally responsible for flooding the nation with foreign disinformation just to be clear we we have not censored the president we have not taken the tweets down that you're referencing um they have more context and a label applied to them and we do the same for leaders around the world do the russian government and other foreign nations continue to attempt to use your company's platforms to spread this information and influence the 2020 election can you briefly describe what you are seeing we do continue to see interference we recently disclosed actions we took on both russia and actions originating out of iran we've made those disclosures public we can you know share those with with your team but this remains as you've heard from others uh on the panel and as mark has detailed one of our highest priorities uh and something we want to make sure that we are focused on uh eliminating as much uh platform manipulation as possible would you say that the political ideology of the employees of your company is you know let's say 50 50 conservative versus uh uh liberal progressive or do you think it's closer to 90 liberal 10 conservative we'll start with mr dorsey um as you mentioned i don't know the the makeup of our employees because it's not something we ask or focus on just just what do you think off top of your head based on your chat rooms and kind of people you talk to not not something i look for or right the question was does twitter have the ability to influence the elections you said no you do you still stand by that that that answer twitter is a company no no no you don't think you have the ability by by moderation policies by senator lee would i would call it censoring you know what you do with new york post you don't think that censorship that moderation and policies you don't think that influences the elections by withholding what i believe is true information for american public you don't think that interferes in elections not our current moderation policies our current moderation policies are to protect the conversation and the integrity of the conversation around the elections okay for both mr zuckerberg and dorsey who who censored censored new york post stories or throttled them back do either one of you have any evidence that the new york post story is part of russian disinformation or that those emails aren't authentic dude any of you have any any information whatsoever they're not authentic or that they are russian disinformation mr darcy we don't you know so so why would why would you censor it why did you prevent that from being disseminated on your platform that is supposed to be for the free expression of ideas and particularly true ideas we believe to fill a foul over hacking materials policy uh we judged him oh whatever that was hacked they weren't hacked we we judged in a moment that it looked like it was hacked materials you were wrong and and we updated our policy and our enforcement within 24 hours let me give you a tweet that was put up on on twitter it says senator ron johnson is my neighbor and strangled our dog buttons right in front of my four-year-old son and three-year-old daughter the police refused to investigate this is a complete lie but important to retweet and note that there are more of my lies to come now we contacted twitter and we asked him to take it down and here's the response thanks for reaching out we escalated this to our support team for their review and they have determined that this is not a violation of our policies that tweet was was retweeted like suddenly 17 000 times and viewed by over and loved commented you know appreciated by over 50 000 people how is that not voter suppression how's that not election interference how does that now that that affect the civic integrity well we'll have to look uh into our enforcement um or not enforcement in this case of the tweet and we can get back to you with more context so mr zuckerberg in that same june hearing real quick mr dorsey you referred to that june hearing with uh stefan wolfgram had all kinds of good ideas that's 16 months ago why haven't you enter why haven't you implemented any of those transparency ideas that you thought were pretty good 16 months ago well he was talking about algorithmic choice and we have implemented one of them which is we allow people to turn off the ranking of our timeline uh the rest is is work and it's going to take some timesome of you don't trust we're acting in good faith that's the problem i want to focus on solving how does services like twitter earn your trust thank you members of the commerce committee for the opportunity to speak with the american people about twitter and section 230. my remarks will be brief so we can get to questions section 230 is the most important law protecting internet speech and removing section 230 will remove speech from the internet section 230 gave internet services two important tools the first provides immunity from liability for users content the second provides good samaritan protections for content moderation and removal even of constitutionally protected speech as long as it's done in good faith that concept of good faith is what's being challenged by many of you today some of you don't trust we're acting in good faith that's the problem i want to focus on solving how do services like twitter earn your trust how do we ensure more choice in the market if we don't there are three solutions we'd like to propose to address the concerns raised all focused on services that decide to moderate or remove content it could be expansions to section 230 new legislative frameworks or commitment to industry-wide self-regulation best practices the first is requiring a services moderation process to be published our cases reported and reviewed our decisions made what tools are used to enforce publishing answers to questions like these will make our process more robust and accountable to the people we serve the second is requiring a straightforward process to appeal decisions made by humans or by algorithms this ensures people can let us know when we don't get it right so we can fix any mistakes and make our processes better in the future and finally much of the content people see today is determined by algorithms with very little visibility into how they choose what they show we took a first step in making this more transparent by building a button to turn off our home timeline algorithms it's a good start but we're inspired by the market approach suggested by dr stephen wolfram before this committee in june 2019 enabling people to choose algorithms created by third parties to rank and filter the content is an incredibly energizing idea that's in reach requiring one moderation process and practices to be published two a straightforward process to appeal decisions and three best efforts around algorithmic choice our suggestions to address the concerns we all have going forward and they're all achievable in short order it's critical as we consider these solutions we optimize for new startups and independent developers doing so ensures a level playing field that increases the probability of competing ideas to help solve problems we mustn't entrench the largest companies any further thank you for the time and i look forward to a productive discussion to dig into these and other ideas the three witnesses we have before this committee today collectively pose i believe the single greatest threat to free speech in america and the greatest threat we have to free and fair elections but today i want to focus my questioning on mr dorsey and on twitter because of the three players before us i think twitter's conduct has by far been the most egregious mr dorsey does twitter have the ability to influence elections no you don't believe twitter has any ability to influence elections no we are one part of a spectrum of communication challenges that people have so you're testifying to this committee right now that that twitter when it silences people when it censors people when it blocks political speech that has no impact on elections people people have choice of other communication channels with which not if they don't hear information if you don't think you have the power to influence elections why do you block anything uh well we have policies that are focused on making sure that more voices on the platform are possible we see a lot of abuse and harassment which ends up silencing people and helping them leave from the platform why did twitter make the decision to censor the new york post uh we had a hack materials policy um when was that policy adopted uh in 2018 i believe in 2018 go ahead what was what was the policy so the policy is around um limiting the spread of materials that are hacked we didn't want twitter to be a distributor for hack materials we found that the newer post because it showed the direct materials screenshots of the direct materials and it was unclear how those were attained that it felt that it fell under this policy now so in your view if it's unclear the source of a document in this instance the new york post documented what it said the source was which it said it was a a laptop owned by hunter biden that had been turned into a repair store so they weren't hiding what they claimed to be the source is it your position that twitter when you can't tell the source blocks blocks press stories no not at all um we our team made a fast decision uh the enforcement action however of blocking urls both in tweets and uh in dm in direct messages we believe was incorrect and we changed it today the new york post is still blocked from tweeting two weeks later yes they have to log into their account which they can do at this minute delete the original tweet which fell under our original enforcement actions and they can tweet the exact same material from the exact same article and it would go through so mr dorsey your ability is you have the power to force a media out and let's be clear the new york post isn't just some random guy tweeting the new york post has the fourth highest circulation of any newspaper in america the new york post is over 200 years old the new york post was founded by alexander hamilton and your position is that that you can sit in silicon valley and demand of the media that you can tell them what stories they can publish and you can tell the american people what reporting they can hear is that right no this was this was a you know every person every account uh every uh organization that signs up to twitter agrees to terms of service in terms of service so media lets us genuflect and obey your dictates if they wish to be able to communicate with readers is that right no not at all we you know we we recognized an error in this policy and specifically the enforcement did twitter block the distribution of the new york times story a few weeks ago that purported to be based on copies of president trump's tax returns we didn't find that a violation of our terms of service and this policy in particular because there's reporting about the material it wasn't distributing the material okay well that's actually not true that they posted what they purported to be original source materials and federal law federal statute makes it a crime a federal felony to distribute someone's tax returns against their knowledge so that material was based on something that was distributed in violation of federal law and yet twitter gleefully allowed people to circulate that but when the article was critical of joe biden twitter engaged in rampant uh censorship and silencing and again we recognized errors in that policy we we changed it within 24 hours this is this is what you're still watching the new york post you haven't changed it we have changed it they can log into their account delete the original tweet you forced the politico reporter to take down his post about the new york post as well is that correct within that 24-hour period yes but we you know as the policy has changed anyone can tweet something you can censor the new york post you expense or politico presumably you can censor the new york times or any other media outlet mr dorsey who the hell elected you and put you in charge of what the media are allowed to report and what the american people are allowed to hear and why do you persist in behaving as a democratic super pac silencing views to the contrary your political belief we're not doing that and this is why i opened this hearing with calls for more transparency we realize we need to earn trust more we realize that more accountability is needed to show our intentions and to show the outcomes thank you so i i hear the concerns and acknowledge them but we want to fix it with more transparency mr dorsey how does it claim by chinese communists that the u.s military is to blame for covid remain up for two months without a fact check and the president's tweet about security mail and ballots get labeled instantly as you mentioned we did label that tweet um as we think about enforcement we consider severity of offline of potential offline harm and we act as quickly as we can we have taken action against tweets from world leaders all around the world including the president and we did take action on that tweet because we saw it we saw the confusion it might encourage and we labeled it accordingly and the goal with the labeling you're speaking of the president's tweet yes okay the goal of our labeling is to provide more context to connect the dots uh so that people can have more information so they can make decisions for themselves we you know we we've created these policies recently we are enforcing them um there are certainly things that we can do much faster but generally we believe that the policy was enforced in a timely manner and uh in the right regard and and yet uh you seem to have no objection to um a tweet by the chinese communist party saying the u.s army brought the epidemic to wuhan well we did and we we labeled that tweet um providing providing too much to do so is that correct i'm not sure of the exact time frame but we can get back to you on that we believe it's important for everyone to hear from global leaders and we have policies around world leaders we want to make sure that um we are respecting um their right to speak uh and and to uh publish what they need but if there is a violation of our terms of service uh we want to label it mr dorsey do you believe that the holocaust really happened yes or no yes so you would agree that someone who says the holocaust may not have happened is spreading misinformation yes or no yes i appreciate your answers on this but they surprised me and probably a lot of other colorads and americans after all iran's ayatollah has done exactly this questioning the holocaust and yet his tweets remain unflagged on twitter's platform can you name any other instance of twitter hiding or deleting a tweet from heads of state uh not not off the top of my head but we have many examples across world leaders around the world would you be willing to provide a list of those absolutely it's strange to me that you've flagged the tweets from the president but haven't hidden the ayatollah's tweets on holocaust denial or calls to wipe israel off the map does twitter maintain a formal list of certain accounts that you actively monitor for misinformation no and we don't have a policy against misinformation we have a policy against misinformation in three categories which are manipulated media public health specifically covet and civic integrity election and election interference and voter suppression that is all we have policy on for misleading information we do not have policy or enforcement for any other types of misleading information that you're mentioning so somebody denying the murder of millions of people or instigating violence against a country as a head of state is not categorically falling in any of those three misinformation or other categories twitter has not misinformation but we do have other policies around incitement to violence uh which which may um some some of the tweets you mentioned are the examples that you're mentioning uh may fall fallow um but for misleading information uh we're focused on those three categories only for about a hundred years foreign sources have been trying to influence u.s policy in u.s elections now they're onto your platforms they see this as a way to get access to the american people so given your refusal to censor or ban foreign dictators while regularly censoring the president aren't you at this very moment personally responsible for flooding the nation with foreign disinformation just to be clear we we have not censored the president we have not taken the tweets down that you're referencing um they have more context and a label applied to them and we do the same for leaders around the world do the russian government and other foreign nations continue to attempt to use your company's platforms to spread this information and influence the 2020 election can you briefly describe what you are seeing we do continue to see interference we recently disclosed actions we took on both russia and actions originating out of iran we've made those disclosures public we can you know share those with with your team but this remains as you've heard from others uh on the panel and as mark has detailed one of our highest priorities uh and something we want to make sure that we are focused on uh eliminating as much uh platform manipulation as possible would you say that the political ideology of the employees of your company is you know let's say 50 50 conservative versus uh uh liberal progressive or do you think it's closer to 90 liberal 10 conservative we'll start with mr dorsey um as you mentioned i don't know the the makeup of our employees because it's not something we ask or focus on just just what do you think off top of your head based on your chat rooms and kind of people you talk to not not something i look for or right the question was does twitter have the ability to influence the elections you said no you do you still stand by that that that answer twitter is a company no no no you don't think you have the ability by by moderation policies by senator lee would i would call it censoring you know what you do with new york post you don't think that censorship that moderation and policies you don't think that influences the elections by withholding what i believe is true information for american public you don't think that interferes in elections not our current moderation policies our current moderation policies are to protect the conversation and the integrity of the conversation around the elections okay for both mr zuckerberg and dorsey who who censored censored new york post stories or throttled them back do either one of you have any evidence that the new york post story is part of russian disinformation or that those emails aren't authentic dude any of you have any any information whatsoever they're not authentic or that they are russian disinformation mr darcy we don't you know so so why would why would you censor it why did you prevent that from being disseminated on your platform that is supposed to be for the free expression of ideas and particularly true ideas we believe to fill a foul over hacking materials policy uh we judged him oh whatever that was hacked they weren't hacked we we judged in a moment that it looked like it was hacked materials you were wrong and and we updated our policy and our enforcement within 24 hours let me give you a tweet that was put up on on twitter it says senator ron johnson is my neighbor and strangled our dog buttons right in front of my four-year-old son and three-year-old daughter the police refused to investigate this is a complete lie but important to retweet and note that there are more of my lies to come now we contacted twitter and we asked him to take it down and here's the response thanks for reaching out we escalated this to our support team for their review and they have determined that this is not a violation of our policies that tweet was was retweeted like suddenly 17 000 times and viewed by over and loved commented you know appreciated by over 50 000 people how is that not voter suppression how's that not election interference how does that now that that affect the civic integrity well we'll have to look uh into our enforcement um or not enforcement in this case of the tweet and we can get back to you with more context so mr zuckerberg in that same june hearing real quick mr dorsey you referred to that june hearing with uh stefan wolfgram had all kinds of good ideas that's 16 months ago why haven't you enter why haven't you implemented any of those transparency ideas that you thought were pretty good 16 months ago well he was talking about algorithmic choice and we have implemented one of them which is we allow people to turn off the ranking of our timeline uh the rest is is work and it's going to take some time\n"

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's Senate hearing testimony in 18 minutes (supercut)

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