Priorities and exclusions within Trust and Safety industry standards

Abstract

Platform governance is simultaneously a matter of public concern and a professional calling for Trust and Safety, the nascent field tasked with setting and enforcing standards of acceptable behavior on digital platforms. Yet we know little about how the growing professionalization of platform governance shapes content moderation practices. Using the schema of content abuse from the Trust & Safety Professional Association, we analyzed the Community Guidelines of 12 diverse livestreaming platforms. Our findings reveal significant alignment between professional guidelines and industry practices, which is especially pronounced for Twitch and YouTube. However, industry standards only partially address the policies of adult camming platforms and AfreecaTV, a Korean-based livestreaming service, revealing notable absences in how Trust and Safety imagines the boundaries of the industry. We reflect on the priorities and exclusions of emerging industry standards and conclude with a call for academics and practitioners to broaden the conversation around content moderation.