Microsoft released the '2022 H1 Transparency Report' as part of a new approach to community safety within the Xbox ecosystem. The first report provides information on the content moderation, player protections, family and online safety protections, account privacy, and more. This report spans the first six months of 2022, and Microsoft announced that it is committed to releasing a Transparency Report every six months.
Highlights of the 2022 H1 Transparency Report include Microsoft's proactive enforcement against inauthentic accounts. In the first half of 2022, Microsoft banned over 4.33m accounts for inauthenticity, which totaled roughly 57% of all enacted enforcements during this period. These automated accounts harm player experiences in games and in online communities, so Microsoft has ramped up its enforcement of these accounts by nine times over last year.
Additionally, this report highlights the value of community safety and content moderation agents, which are online 24/7/365. Microsoft is committed to ensuring the Xbox experience is enjoyable by all communities equally.
Transparent Community Initiatives
Microsoft Released its First-Ever 'Transparency Report' for Xbox
Trend Themes
1. Proactive Enforcement on Authenticity - The trend is for companies to increase their enforcement against 'fake' accounts that hurt user and customer experiences.
2. Increased Focus on Community Safety Features - Companies like Microsoft are focusing on community safety initiatives to ensure an enjoyable user experience for all.
3. Transparency Reports Becoming Common Practice - Companies are committing to releasing regular transparency reports to promote transparency, accountability, and trust among their stakeholders.
Industry Implications
1. Gaming - The gaming industry can innovate with community safety features, such as better algorithms, AI, and increased human moderation to ensure gamers enjoy fair and safe gameplay experiences.
2. Social Media - Social media platforms can increase their efforts to detect and remove fake accounts that cause disinformation and influence campaign problems and publish transparency reports that enforce community standards and policies.
3. E-commerce - E-commerce companies can reinforce customer trust by proactively implementing security and privacy features and releasing transparency reports outlining their compliance with government regulations and best practices.