Twitter Makes It Easier to Report Threats to Law Enforcement

"Today [Tuesday] we're starting to roll out a change that makes it easier for you to report threats that you feel may warrant attention from law enforcement," noted official Twitter blog about the threat reporting feature.

The micro-blogging website doesn't report threats to concerned authorities for you, but it provides an "Email report" option that will summarise all the relevant information in an email from the Twitter Safety Team, which can be then be kept for the user's records or given to authorities. Alongside the email report option, mute and block options are also provided for use in the "meantime".

Once a user reports a threatening tweet directed at them to Twitter (via the Report option seen alongside every tweet), they will see an option on the last screen to receive a official report summary from the Twitter Safety via email. The summary will contain the threatening tweet and URL along with the Twitter username and URL of the threatening user, as well as the timestamp of when the user filed the report.

Twitter has also provided guidelines for law enforcement explaining what additional information company has and can provide to concerned authorities, and this is linked in the email report generated by the firm.

"While we take threats of violence seriously and will suspend responsible accounts when appropriate, we strongly recommend contacting your local law enforcement if you're concerned about your physical safety. We hope that providing you with a summary of your report will make that process easier for you," added Twitter blog.

Meanwhile, Twitter has acquired live video streaming app Periscope, which is still in beta testing. The company recently confirmed its Twitter acquisition.

The live video streaming app in a tweet confirmed the news and also revealed that it joined Twitter back in January, which is in-line with an earlier report that stressed that the deal was closed for weeks. Periscope said, "You may have heard some news: It involves a blue bird."