Moscow, Apr 21 (Agency) Twitter on Friday removed the “state-affiliated” and “government-funded” labels from news media accounts with government involvement in editorial content. Twitter dropped the labels tagged to the accounts of, among others, RIA Novosti, Sputnik, the BBC, ABC News, SBS News and CBC News.
In 2020, Twitter’s administration reported that it had begun tagging media pages that it believed were under the control of the authorities, as well as the accounts of the authorities of permanent members of the UN Security Council, key government officials, including foreign ministers, ambassadors, official representatives and major diplomatic leaders. Until recently, the label had typically been applied to Twitter accounts of state media outlets in non-Western countries that were alleged to lack editorial independence.