New Delhi: Following a report on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s letter to Twitter chief executive officer Parag Aggarwal over his follower count, the micro-blogging site on Thursday assured that the numbers are “meaningful and accurate”.
A spokesperson for Twitter said that the follower counts is a visible feature and the company has a “zero-tolerance approach to platform manipulation and spam”, adding that, “We fight spam and malicious automation strategically and at scale with machine learning tools, and as part of those consistent and ongoing efforts to ensure a healthy service and credible accounts, follower counts can and do fluctuate”.
Rahul blames Twitter for limiting followers ‘under govt pressure’
In his letter to newly appointed CEO Parag Aggarwal, Gandhi said that his reach appeared to have been limited on the micro-blogging platform after “pressure by the government to silence my voice”, according to people familiar with the matter. One of his tweets was recently taken down for violating Twitter’s content guidelines.
“I want to bring your attention to what I believe is Twitter’s unwitting complicity in curbing free and fair speech in India… I have been reliably, albeit discreetly, informed by people at Twitter India that they are under immense pressure by the government to silence my voice,” Gandhi’s letter to Twitter reads, as per reports.
Meanwhile, the spokesperson said that Twitter removes millions of accounts each week for violating the company’s policies on platform manipulation and spam. While some Twitter handles notice minor differences in follower count, the spokesperson added, the numbers could be higher in certain cases.
