X’s block feature change empowers abusers and endangers victims

X’s block feature change has sparked outrage, especially when the platform’s defense for the change all but confirmed it’s catering to abusers.

Since acquiring Twitter, Elon Musk has steadily been destroying the platform, which he renamed X. Following his takeover, the social media site has become a hotspot for right-wing extremists, who now use it as a platform to spread misinformation and hateful rhetoric. The right-wing takeover of X means countless users experience intense harassment, bullying, and threats of physical and sexual violence if they post anything that goes against the right-wing agenda.

For many journalists, politicians, public figures, and other individuals whose work and passions require a social media presence, blocking the trolls was the only aspect of X that allowed some peace and security. Of course, Musk quickly decided to take away that feature. He announced in September that he would render the block function on X useless by allowing users to still see every public post the person who blocked them makes, although they can’t interact with it. On October 16, X confirmed the change was going into effect shortly. In addition to its numerous safety concerns, Engineering on X had a suspicious excuse for the change.

The safety concerns of changing the X block feature

Following Engineering on X’s announcement that the block feature changes would take effect soon, the post was inundated with comments pointing out how this change will hurt the most vulnerable individuals.

There are countless women and girls on X who have their stalkers and abusers blocked. If these women can’t or don’t immediately privatize their accounts, all of these abusers and stalkers will suddenly have access to their entire public X history, including possible identifying information about their whereabouts. Women in abusive relationships who have their partners blocked might face retaliation for things they posted in the past.

Then, of course, there’s the harassment. With harassment and threats rampant on X, many users have utilized the block feature to protect themselves and their mental health. Now, harassers can still see their victims’ posts and screenshot them. However, since they can’t comment, they’ll likely start making public posts with insults, threats, and vile messages. Meanwhile, the person who blocked them won’t even be notified that these people are posting about them since the person is blocked. As a female journalist, I’ve already experienced harassment on X. Once, the platform failed to notify me that a handful of deeply disturbed men had spent hours going through every single X post I ever posted and leaving sick comments on them. That was hard enough. I can’t imagine the shock of suddenly finding out someone has made hundreds of sick, public posts about me that I was never notified of because I blocked the poster.

It’s true that a lot of stalkers, abusers, and harassers simply make burner accounts to get around the block feature. However, creating another account requires an entirely new e-mail address and/or phone number, username, and password. Also, some people aren’t tech-savvy enough to understand the whole burner accounts and blocking business. The small hassle and obstacles to creating new accounts mean victims have small protections from their abusers. Now, though, X wants to wipe away that small protection, and the reason for it is quite horrific.

How X’s new policy caters to abusers

In response to the numerous concerns of harassment, abuse, and stalking, Engineering on X explained why the feature was changed. It said it was concerned that some individuals used the block feature to “share or hide harmful or private information about those they’ve blocked.” Essentially, it’s changing the block feature because they think it’s important that blocked individuals can tell if the person who blocked them is talking about them online.

To me, that post was a confirmation that the platform thinks it’s more important to cater to abusers than protect victims. It’s essentially confirming it wants abusers to be able to tell if their victim is making allegations about them so that they can retaliate. After all, when someone is abusing, harassing, and trying to harm someone, they usually want the victim to know. The only reason I can think of why someone would block another person before talking about them is because they’re a victim and afraid of retaliation. X already has a policy prohibiting individuals from sharing private or harmful material about someone else. An individual sharing such information would be quickly reported and face consequences, whether the person they posted about saw it or not. Also, the old block feature already allowed a blocked person to see posts that mentioned them if they reported/flagged the person who blocked them.

Since there were already measures in place to prevent it, people posting harmful/private information about people they blocked wasn’t a significant issue. So, why is X so concerned about people who are blocked seeing what the person who blocked them is saying about them? Considering that victims have already faced defamation lawsuits for so much as identifying as survivors of abusers online without naming their abusers, it sounds like X wants to make it even easier for abusers to retaliate. It seems like it wants abusers or just bad people, in general, to be able to immediately silence someone speaking the truth about them. Knowing they can’t speak without potential retaliation, countless victims will be unable to experience the healing and validation of sharing their stories online.

It’s not surprising. Musk is probably blocked on X by thousands, if not millions, of users and wants to be able to target them for speaking their opinions on his numerous controversies. He’s so desperate to help others like him silence, retaliate against, and intimidate their victims for speaking out that he’s willing to endanger countless women and girls on his platform.