Twitch has announced new verification tools to help combat harassment.
The livestreaming platform will be adding the new features in an attempt to target the amount of hate and harassment that takes place on streams.
Over the past few weeks, hashtags such as #DoBetterTwitch or #ADayOffTwitch have been trending on Twitter with people demanding action from Twitch bosses – and the site’s developers are finally listening.
The platform said it will implement phone verification chat controls, which will allow streamers to be able to require a viewer to have a verified phone number to chat, with Twitch hoping this will reduce the number of bots that are programmed to automatically send hate to content creators.
Twitch will also take more drastic action when it comes to banning accounts, as when one account is banned, all accounts linked to the same phone number or email address will automatically be terminated as well.
The streaming platform said it hoped the new measures would "reduce the number of channels" impacted by abuse.
In a statement, they added: "No single tech solution will ever block bad actors' behaviour entirely.
"Our work to make Twitch safer will never be over, just as there'll never be a single fix for harassment and hate online."
The news comes after Twitch also recently upped the ante on their proactive filters, which will be able to detect and block more “hate speech” in chats than ever before.
The company said: “[We identified] a vulnerability in our proactive filters, and have rolled out an update to close this gap and better detect hate speech in chat.”
