Twitter Australia has no staff left to deal with child sexual abuse material

Elon Musk’s Twitter has no Australian staff who can respond to reports of child sexual abuse material, months after the tech company laid off the majority of its global workforce.

On Monday morning, acting chief operating officer for the office of the eSafety commissioner Toby Dagg appeared in front of the parliamentary joint committee into how law enforcement is responding to child exploitation.

Greens Senator David Shoebridge asked about Twitter’s handling of child sexual abuse material in light of NBC News reporting that found it was rife on the platform since Musk took over. Dagg told the committee the company did not have any local staff handling reports.

“There are no Australian staff left here, and the Australian complement was a really critical component of Twitter’s trust and safety apparatus as far as we were concerned,” he said.

While still having contact with “regional” staff, Dagg said the eSafety commissioner’s office was concerned about how local staffing cuts would impact how it could handle child exploitation.

“It’s not only the presence of trust and safety personnel in a company that makes a difference, but the ability for a regulator like the eSafety commissioner to pick up a phone to local representatives and tell them that they’ve got a problem or they want to raise something to your attention,” he said.

These comments come after Musk’s Twitter promised the eSafety commissioner’s office in November that its staffing cuts would not affect its ability to comply with Australian laws.

Musk cut nearly 70% of Twitter’s staff after taking over the company in October. Soon afterwards, he promised the issue of child sexual exploitation content was “priority #1” for his company.