Twitter outlaws notorious troll Milo Yiannopoulos amidst coordinated abuse of Ghostbusters star
Breitbart technology editor Milo Yiannopoulos has been banned from Twitter for life after inciting his followers to direct a wave of racist abuse toward Ghostbusters star Leslie Jones.
This followed a personal intervention by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey after Jones suffered days of online abuse amidst complaints that the social network was failing to protect its members.
In a statement released following the suspension Twitter said: “People should be able to express diverse opinions and beliefs on Twitter. But no one deserves to be subjected to targeted abuse online, and our rules prohibit inciting or engaging in the targeted abuse or harassment of others.
“Over the past 48 hours in particular, we've seen an uptick in the number of accounts violating these policies and have taken enforcement actions against these accounts, ranging from warnings that also require the deletion of Tweets violating our policies to permanent suspension.”
The suspension came too late to keep Jones on the platform however with the actress announcing that she would be quitting with a ‘very sad heart’ in light of the abuse.
I leave Twitter tonight with tears and a very sad heart.All this cause I did a movie.You can hate the movie but the shit I got today...wrong
— Leslie Jones (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016