Social media platform The company has blocked users from searching for Taylor Swift after fake sexually explicit images of the pop singer went viral on social media this week, executives announced Sunday.
On Sunday afternoon, a search for Swift's name on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter resulted in the message “Something went wrong. Please try reloading.”
“This is a temporary measure and was taken out of an abundance of caution to prioritize safety in this matter,” Joe Benarroch, X's director of business operations, said in a statement.
Swift was named Time Magazine's Person of the Year in 2023 after embarking on a record-breaking global tour and becoming the world's most streamed music artist.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Friday called the fake images “alarming” and said social media companies have a responsibility to prevent the spread of such misinformation.
Jean-Pierre said at a news conference that enforcement of false images, likely created by artificial intelligence, is lax and disproportionately affects women.
The New York Times reports that one of Swift's images shared on X was viewed 47 million times before the account was suspended.
criticized
Since billionaire Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022, he has been criticized for his own controversial posts and efforts to overhaul the platform's content moderation policies. Many advertisers on the platform are holding back on spending for fear of appearing next to harmful posts.
Read: Want to avoid fake news? Stay away from Google
X said the vast majority of content views are “healthy” posts. Musk and X CEO Linda Yaccarino announced a new policy called “Free Speech, Not Reach” that would limit the distribution of some posts but refrain from deleting them. — Luc Cohen, (c) 2024 Reuters