Police in the United Kingdom on Sunday announced that a Manchester man had been arrested after making threats of rape against a women via Twitter. Channel 4 reports that the threats were made against Caroline Criado-Perez, a women's rights activist who had been campaigning to have Jane Austen appear on British currency. Criado-Perez succeeded in her campaign last week, as the UK unveiled a £10 note with the face of Jane Austen on one side. However, Criado-Perez was soon subjected to a torrent of abuse on Twitter.
Channel 4 cites police in reporting that a 21-year-old was arrested in the Greater Manchester area on suspicion of harassment. The police are quoted as saying the arrest was in connection with an allegation of malicious communications sent on Thursday, July 25.
This is not the first time a Twitter user has gotten into trouble with the law because of how they're using the micro-blogging site. This time last year, a teenager in the UK was arrested and eventually issued a harassment warning for sending abusive tweets to Olympic diver Tom Daly among others.
For its part, Twitter says that the ability to report abuse via multiple platforms is on the way.
"The ability to report individual tweets for abuse is currently available on Twitter for iPhone and we plan to bring this functionality to other platforms, including Android and the web.
