80% of the online abuse directed at the BBC is aimed at one journalist

According to a report in the Independent, BBC journalist Marianna Spring is target of more than 80 per cent of the messages flagged as online abuse received by the corporation. 

Spring, 27, the BBC’s first disinformation and social media correspondent,hosts the BBC Sounds podcast Marianna in Conspiracyland. 

In a recent Times profile, it was stated that the BBC has software that marks messages containing physical threats, cyberbullying, violent language, negative sentiment and doxxing (releasing personal information such as address or phone number). Of 14,488 pieces of correspondence that were automatically marked for review and further escalation, 11,771 were directed at Spring.

After joining the BBC as part of Newsnight in 2019, Marianna Spring moved on to a dedicated role reporting on online disinformation the following year. 

I gather that a significant proportion of the abuse she receives mentions various theories about COVID-19, most of which are too utterly stupid to deserve being given even the tiniest trace of oxygen by describing them here. Having heard her comment on some of the propaganda put out by a whole range of conspiracy theorists and by certain regimes, it would not in the least surprise me if some of this abuse is coming, not from individuals but from the troll-farms and bots of certain hostile state actors, particularly - but not only - Putin's Russia.  

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