Former President Barack Obama woke up to see a shocking number of supporters disappear from his social media following. He’s not the only one. A new measure by the social network has just exposed a trend, and many liberals are affected.
According to The Daily Caller, the drop in Twitter followers came after the platform formally announced on Wednesday that it would begin the process of removing “locked accounts” from follower counts in an effort “to build trust and encourage healthy conversation on Twitter.”
Trump remains the 18th most followed person on the social media site.
Twitter explained why they’ve pushed for a purge on their blog:
As part of our ongoing and global effort to build trust and encourage healthy conversation on Twitter, every part of the service matters. Follower counts are a visible feature, and we want everyone to have confidence that the numbers are meaningful and accurate.
Over the years, we’ve locked accounts when we detected sudden changes in account behavior. In these situations, we reach out to the owners of the accounts and unless they validate the account and reset their passwords, we keep them locked with no ability to log in. This week, we’ll be removing these locked accounts from follower counts across profiles globally. As a result, the number of followers displayed on many profiles may go down.
Most people will see a change of four followers or fewer; others with larger follower counts will experience a more significant drop. We understand this may be hard for some, but we believe accuracy and transparency make Twitter a more trusted service for public conversation.
Though the most significant changes are happening in the next few days, follower counts may continue to change more regularly as part of our ongoing work to proactively identify and challenge problematic accounts.