Twitter executives apologized Tuesday for suspending the account of a journalist who was critical of NBC’s Olympics coverage. Twitter also published a lengthy blog post by its general counsel addressing the microblogging network’s trust and safety procedures in general.
British journalist Guy Adams had his account suspended Monday after he published a tweet reading, “The man responsible for NBC pretending the Olympics haven’t started yet is Gary Zenkel. Tell him what u think! Email: Gary.zenkel@nbcuni.com.”
Adams had previously been a harsh critic one of many on Twitter of NBC’s tape-delayed Olympics coverage.
The suspension sparked a worldwide backlash against Twitter for censorship and overreacting to criticism of NBC, with which it has an Olympics partnership. The backlash intensified Tuesday after the Telegraph reported that Twitter had told NBC about the offending tweet which didn’t technically appear to violate Twitter’s stated privacy rules and helped it through the process of requesting a suspension.
